Month: December 2021

So here I am……an average 55 year old grumpy mummy….PETRIFIED about how quickly technology is advancing. As with an average 55 year old, I am taking note and attempting to learn only what I absolutely have to in order to get things done in my little non technologically advanced world. For the rest of it, I pretend it is not happening. I do not enjoy the fear and ignorance. I wish I had the inclination (and brain power) to learn it all……..but nope, not this puppy!!

I do, however, have children, who are totally interested in this new world. Each has different interests and for different reasons, but for the most part, I think 3 year old’s are more technologically literate than I am.

My one son, Pepper, is very much into his crypto currency. Bear in mind, that this is so foreign to me, that I initially spelt it ‘’krypto currency’’!! So he has been trying to sway me in that direction for a while, but like any normal 55 year old, I was having none of it!!!!!

“What is it?’’ I would ask.

‘’Mom, it’s the future. That is how people are going to invest going forward. It is higher risk than the ‘’old fashioned’’ insurance policies, and putting your money in a bank account, but the returns are much greater,” he would reply, clearly NOT answering my question!!

‘’Where would my money go?’’ I would ask, precariously implying that I was even giving this nonsense any of my much needed energy!!

‘’It’s there mom, you can draw it out anytime you want”, clearly STILL NOT answering my question!!

Anyway this crypto crap was brought up at any given opportunity, but he soon realised I was not taking the bait.

So in the interim, my Pepper was watching YouTube tutorials at every given opportunity. Educating himself about it, listening to what ‘’the experts’’ had to say and basically immersing himself in the knowledge of this intangible thing they call crypto currency.

Now, since my Pepper has started working, he has, without hesitation, put 75% of his (not huge) pay check into crypto. This is done before said 75% even has a chance to unpack it’s clothing in his bank account! The remaining 25% is used for entertainment, i.e ordering take away food and/or eating out. This remaining 25% is invariably depleted a week or so after it was deposited. With that, he would then ask me…… she who is constantly told,  ‘’I am an adult now and don’t need you to treat me like a child’’ mummy, for a loan. Why does his dummy of a mummy agree to give him the loan? Well because the mongrel child has no money for such trivial things as……uuuum…airtime……PETROL…..and some such!!!!!

The loan is always paid back though. Okay let me rephrase that…..I am always asked whether he must repay it, or whether he can put it into crypto for me? This is such a regular occurrence that Salt will blurt out every pay day, “Mom, must I pay you back, or can I invest it in crypto’’, sounding exactly like Pepper. And we all laugh and laugh….and Pepper laughs some more, probably reflecting on how cunningly he has managed to con his mummy.

You surely see where this is going?? My son Pepper, has slowly managed to force me to invest in this intangible Universe they call ‘’crypto’’. It is not a large amount, but I have repeatedly been advised that by December 2021….yes…..right now….we would be ‘’retiring’’. So, here we are…..December 2021…..and I asked him when he is cashing in our ‘’retirement fund’’. Well, apparently things have not gone quite as planned, but apparently we are still very much on the road to ‘’retiring’’!!

I still constantly insist that this is a load of hogwash, and the whole world is being duped, and he constantly tries to explain that this is very real, and it is not going away anytime soon.

“Okay my son, I trust you…..I have faith in you….make us rich, ‘’ I repeatedly, well actually patronisingly tell him.

Anyhoo, tired of my scepticism, he asked to sit down with me the other day, so that he could show me a graph of what he has done. He has put some here, some there, some here and there, but overall, I was not seeing where my retirement money was being made.

“Mom, be patient, it needs to be handled very carefully, as you have to predict the ‘next best thing’ in order to make proper money’’, he said reassuringly.

With all this, I still did not understand where the money was, and how we got it back. This of course made me very anxious about the whole state of affairs. I mean my retirement I was promised….my retirement I WANT!!

So there we were in a shopping centre the other day, and Pepper finally had an opportunity to prove to me the validity of crypto. You could have knocked me over with a feather, before my very eyes was a crypto ATM. So essentially, you can go draw money from this machine…..crypto money. Not sure how, but can’t pretend not to have been hugely excited. So excited, I expressed my willingness to try and proactively start investing in crypto from 2022. I mean, the more little bits n pieces I invest, the sooner my retirement will arrive.

Seeing that there was a spark of acceptance within me, Pepper started explaining the ”Metaverse” to me. The way I understand it, we are literally going to be …..in a not too distant time in the future ……..living in an alternate Universe……..aka the Metaverse. We will be sitting in our rooms, living our ”normal” lives in this alternate Universe. Buying property, applying for jobs, socialising….yes…apparently as we do now, but in this alternate Universe????

So, for some reason, my concentration span lasted longer than the normal 8 seconds, and I was enthralled with this information. I listened….but most astonishingly, HEARD, and even more unlikely, UNDERSTOOD, these words that he was imparting. The processing of it became a little more difficult for me though. All I could muster up, was “that is so f*****d up!!”

“Why mom? Imagine how awesome that would be?” he excitedly asked.

Now, honestly, because the way I understood it is just too much to even comprehend, I am sure I must have misunderstood, and therefore will not be discussing why in all the Metaverses of the Metaverse I find this totally unacceptable!!

But wait….there is more….on assuming I was slowly becoming one of ‘’them’’, Pepper excitedly came to tell me he had invested in piece of NFT art. Well look at you, I thought, who would have thought you would be remotely interested in investing in a piece of art??  

‘’Why did you buy it? Will you be hanging it up?’’ I understandably questioned.

‘’No mom, it’s digital art that can be resold in the digital world”, he said, assuming we now spoke the same language.

‘’What are you talking about Pepper?? You are getting very involved in all this virtual stuff. Please slow down and stop falling for all these money making rackets!!’’ I pleaded.

‘’But mom, it’s an investment’’, he insisted.

‘’How can it be an investment?” I asked. ‘’It’s not even REAL!! Who will buy it from you?? For what?? How does it become more valuable?? Let me see what you bought.” I screeched.

Well showing me the picture did NOTHING to calm me down. It was LITERALLY a random piece of graphic art that I could have produced.

So a few days later he came to tell me that he had sold it, and had made 400 bucks profit.

“Why did you sell it so quickly?’’ I annoyingly asked him.

‘’What do you meeeeeeannnnn???????’’ he waaaaaay more annoyingly asked me.

‘’Well obviously if you want the full benefits, you need to hang onto it for longer?’’ I said…stating the OBVIOUS!!

Please….help me someone…..I am still failing to see where his irritation and confusion with me lay?????? Just trying to help the child!!!

So hi ya all, it’s been a minute. As I anticipated, my Blogs were going to come few and far between. I did not however foresee a vow of silence happening????

Please understand that me, the absolute creature of habit……no chapters or doors closing kind of gal… only comfortable with just same same day in and day out (also known as mundane) life…..had the biggest change (COVID aside), since my husband passed away nearly 16 years ago. Now although it took me about 18 years to recover from that, this was thankfully way less dramatic.

Now let me share with you how ‘’change’’ in my life is defined…..very simply, a new job. Well yes, that is huge, you might say….totally understandable…….but my new job was not even a ‘’new’’ job. It was kind of my one of two old jobs, which became the only job. So, no new office, no new faces, no new job description…… just more time spent in the old office, doing the old work and seeing the old faces more often. However, for this here Madam Papenfuss, it was out with the old, and in with the…..well…. kind of….. marginally……new, but old life…..imagine my anxiety and sleepless nights??

Not only was there this ”dramatic” change, but wait, there was more. My party venue, which I had been running for 15 years on the weekends, started getting bookings again after the likes of COVID reared it’s ugly ass head. So basically, it was a ”what in the hard hit hospitality industry was happening???” Fifteen years I ran the business, not once feeling sorry for myself about the fact that I worked during the week and on weekends, and all of a sudden, I was thinking, how the hell was I going to cope with working during the week AND on weekends?? How was I going to get up and out on my newfound days of rest?? How was it fair that I had to work seven days a week??

So, to sum up….new but old job and continuation after a brief pause of a business that had consumed my weekends for the previous 15 years. Imagine….the horror. How was I supposed to adjust to these ‘’earth shattering’’ changes to my life at the ripe old age of 55??

So, as I said, it’s been a minute. In the meantime my younger son Salt turned 21. What a momentous occasion! Such a deserving dedication was called for. Imagine the blog that could have been devoted to that? Too late…moment is over. Sorry Salt….you deserved a momentous blog. Although my guess is that he couldn’t be happier that he dodged that bullet.

Another event that has plagued us beautiful people on this side of the world….we have been subjected to load shedding….loads and loads of load shedding. Probably a foreign concept to a lot of people. Let me explain….it is when a corrupt and inefficient Government causes the basic AND EXPENSIVE utility service that we pay for every month, to be handed out if and when they decide, as we are ‘’short of electricity’’. Imagine the amount of blogs that I could have devoted to that?? For this, I do not think my children were grateful, as I generally had to vent, poop and fart to them, when normally I would have been slamming my grievances out on a keyboard! 

To top that off, from the *&^% continuous power surges that loadshedding caused, NATURALLY (to someone with a fraction of a brain), our cables and whatever else powers our electricity….intermittently…..had a meltdown, and our area was in the dark for 5 DAYS!!! Always one to make lemonade out of lemons……NOT….there was a whole adventure attached to that too. Now that could easily have involved a couple of blogs…..well when the power returned and allowed for them to be typed!! But nope, sorry for you, that has been another masterpiece or two that you have been deprived of.

And wait……there’s more…..the fifty seventh wave of the nineteenth strain of COVID arrived. PRECISELY …..or perhaps suspiciously (content for yet ANOTHER blog) almost to the minute, as predicted a few months ago. Just in time for us to have our lives and livelihood disrupted again, and for us not to be able to look forward to the two and a half minute holiday season, which we all SO RICHLY DESERVE!!!!

Then in between all that, the 16^th Anniversary of the loss of my husband came and went. I mean, that needed two blogs. One to reflect on the life and times of Grumpy Mummy and her spices post loss, and another to rave and brag about my friends, who never fail, every year, to remember, recognise and provide all the comfort and humour required for the day to be gentler.

So, to get to the point, as quickly as my blogging (re-) started, it paused again. Can’t say I cared much, as I was too busy manufacturing stress and anxiety in my life to even give it a second thought!!

But helloooooooo…..a seed for a very reflective blog was planted in the last couple of weeks, which of course had me anxiously putting myself under pressure to thrash out a long overdue blog. So…..here I am….all yours……try and contain your excitement……. 

But wait…..now that I have got weeks of no blogging off my chest, I am not totally in the mood to write that ever so reflective blog anymore. Well not today at any rate.

Just kinda checking in with the 0.5 followers who have told me they miss my blogs. Not all wasted I suppose.

So just to let you know, I am here, I am no saner, calmer, content or less snarky and sarcastic than I was when we last spoke.  

But as for that reflective blog……naaaah, not today…….maybe tomorrow.