a picture of productivity

(february 9, 2008)

my To Do List has taken a beating lately as i have busted my way through it the past 2 days. i started my productivity streak with an appointment at the dentist. he was a jolly south african fellow who could play santa at any children’s christmas party. he looked at me as though i am paranoid about oral health when i told him what the problem was, but he managed to remedy it in just 45 short minutes and there was not a needle in sight. i realised my least favourite part of the entire dental experience is the polishing. is it possible that there a worse feeling?

i think the friendly atmosphere of the dentist’s office actually being a house helped a lot. dentists’ offices all smell the same at home and that smell alone is enough to emit feelings of nausea and hatred in me. and also unlike dentist’s offices at home, the property of the dentist house was lined with a very obvious and very foreboding electric fence. which i learned was electrified when i could smell something burning and realised a leaf has fell off a tree right on to the fence and was incinerated. then i thought that if you had children in a city like nairobi you would need to teach them not to touch fences.

the To Do List continued to shrink as i used my extra time meant to be spent agonising at the dentist for other more fruitful activities. like pedicures. that, with the current most favourable exchange rate, cost $8.50. it was delightful as always and i got some serious book reading time in. i am not one for small talk with the hair people or the pedicure people. i will talk to the manicure people but only because my hands are not free to hold a book or magazine and it would be a bit awkward to avoid eye contact that entire time.

next up was an eye appointment and picking out new glasses. because i love health insurance that cares about my eyes (and my teeth) as much as i do. i also love my new specs.
then lunch with a colleague, then work (well, more like email reading), then movie watching and relaxing, nothing really of To Do List significance there.

but today! today i ticked off a few more items. and everyone knows that there is no point in a To Do List if not for the satisfaction involved in crossing something off the list. or checking it off if it is my daytimer because i don’t like it to get too messy in there.

first came some job applications (about to become a constant in my life again) then picking up my new spectacles and getting my others tightened with those mini screwdrivers that always seem to get in christmas crackers but never keep for when you actually need them. like now.

then a massage. a most delicious massage that kind of hurt. but in the good way. but i had some knots that were pretty enormous so the massage lady said i should come back, which i probably will because it was so delicious. but only in africa would the massage therapist use her boobs to hold your head up so she can get to your neck. i actually thought it was quite ingenious.

then came roadside flower shopping (ok, not on the To Do List, but fun anyhow). i am not the biggest fan of the rose, but i got 36 of them for the equivalent of $2. it seems that a lot of the kenyan flower exporters will not be able to harvest and transport their flowers to europe for the valentine’s day, the single biggest day of flower sales of the year, as the main flower growing area of the country is one of the worst in terms of violence and displacement at the moment. if you live in europe and don’t have a problem with using fertile ground to grow something inedible and a total luxury nor do you care about ‘food’ miles or the effluent that is leaked into the nearby lakes that is ruining the natural ecosystem, go out and track down some kenyan grown valentine’s flowers and buy them to support the economic recovery of an african country. or buy something locally and naturally grown like a thistle and give it to your valentine, that would be ok too.

more road side shopping and more To Do List crossing with fruit and veg stands on the way home and then home to cross things of the list. who am i kidding, i crossed everything off the list as soon as it was done.