MY FRIENDS MUST BE VERY POOR

 30th OCTOBER 2020

I now think that my friends must be very poor, or they are just not interested in my story, or they cannot read. There must be a reason that I don't know off yet. I hope I find out one day. I say this because the article in the South Coast Sun was a resounding success. Everyone in Toti that I have met since it appeared on Thursday 15th October has commented on it and wished me well, but I have only sold one miserable copy. Only one to a dear, 83-year-old friend of mine, Rosemary Dickens. I find it astonishing that more copies have not been sold. What must I do to get people to part with their money, The only method that has worked so far is to confront the people face to face. Then they cannot run and generally buy. One has taken the book and promised to pay me later. I hope later arrives soon.

I have given a few copies away, One was to my domestic, Doreen Gubese. She offered to buy a copy of The Promised Bridge so I gave it to her. She didn't ask for Living with CNM but I gave her one anyway. I know I don't pay her enough to make her buy a copy. A bit risky maybe, but she has been with us for 8 years and watched me go from walking quite strongly to sitting in a chair permanently. Maybe she deserves to know why. It is also good that she at least likes reading. Nery our missionary bought one, but has not paid for it yet. 4 books were sold into the complex. I still need to ship a whole bunch of books around the country. Next week maybe.

My 70th birthday is coming up on the 14th of November. Audrey has decided that it is a milestone that must be celebrated, so she is arranging a party at The Garden of Eden, or Evil, as some would like to call it. A small, simple affair with 26 odd friends. Or so I thought. One of the invitees is Val Hazel. I forgot that her birthday is on the 13th of November. On hearing my plans she immediately proposed that we have a joint party, She wants to invite 6 or 8 of her closes friends. That's great. Now we are looking at a party of some 32 or more. You just cannot keep a good party small it seems.

My cellulitis is still with me. After 10 days of injections in the bum every day and oral antibiotics twice a day, it seems to be almost healed, but not quite. Technology has moved on though and there is now an antibiotic, antibacterial called Purbac that can be taken for three solid months. If that doesn't kill the bug then nothing will, or I will have to go to the hospital. I do not want to go to hospital. There are too many stories told of people going to the hospital, only to catch Covid-19 or worse, and then dying. That is not for me. The general perception of hospitals is that they are no longer viewed as the Safe Havens that they once were. I am getting so desperate that I am now trying Colloidal Silver, 20 ml by mouth a day and a topical rubdown of the affected area every morning. It has been 8 days now and no miracle cure has happened. Silver is a very effective antibacterial, but streptococcus is not on the list it seems. I am now on 3 months of antibiotics as well as anti-inflammatories. Please pray for me.

More next time.

SPREADING THE WORD.

 It never was and is still not my intention to get rich from selling my books. I know that what I have written will never appeal to the masses and sell thousands of copies. Having said this I do need to recoup my costs. I bought 50 copies from Malherbe the other week and it cost over R4000. Cash upfront. I desperately need all or at least the majority of that money back. There are a lot of people and institutions that need free copies. I would like to give each of the four local libraries a copy each. There are some very close friends that are old and technologically stunted, this means they will never buy a copy from a website on their own, that I will give copies to. The National Library gets a free copy for providing the ISBN number. There are numerous other worthy causes that will get free copies. These costs are lost, but I do need to sell the rest for a profit. I will sell at the same price that Malherbe charges. The saving will be in the courier fees which can be quite high.

    But I also need to sell.

And what better way is there to let the community of Amanzimtoti know that I have arrived than to invite the local newspaper around for a cup of tea, He refused the tea but Earl was a very likeable chap that seemed to take a real interest in what I had to say. He took copious notes and assures me that a full article will appear in next weeks edition of the SUN. That should spread the word far and wide. We also approached Readers Rest, the local book store in Seadoone Mall and they were very keen to take a few copies on consignment stock to put on their shelves. I will continue to search for other sales avenues.

In the meantime my health continues to let me know it means business. I got a bout of Cellulitis on Wed 30th September. Audrey was suffering from high blood pressure at the same time so I sent a picture of my pathetic foot, all red and swollen to my local GP and begged for antibiotics. She responded with a 5-day course. They almost worked, another two days and I would have been healed, so she prescribed a 10-day course of Penicillin, which has worked before. Three days in and accompanied by a very rigorous bout of de-watering, three times a day, and I seem on track to full recovery. I hope so. This bout has been quite painful where previous infections have been relatively pain-free. And so life trundles on, never dull, never boring.