100 days of happiness

happiness

ˈhapɪnɪs/

noun

1. 1.

   the state of being happy.

   "she struggled to find happiness in her life"

   synonyms:

   contentment, pleasure, contentedness, satisfaction, cheerfulness,cheeriness, merriment, merriness, gaiety, joy, joyfulness, joyousness,joviality, jollity, jolliness, glee, blitheness, carefreeness, gladness,delight, good spirits, high spirits, light-heartedness, good cheer, well-being, enjoyment, felicity; exuberance, exhilaration, elation, ecstasy, delirium, jubilation, rapture,bliss,  blissfulness, euphoria, beatitude, transports of delight;  heaven,paradise, seventh heaven, cloud nine;  humorousdelectation; rarejouissance "her eyes shone with happiness"

So, recently I've had several friends invite me to take part in the 100 days of happiness challenge (http://100happydays.com/) that's right- 100 whole days, how hard can that be? I mean if you're licking and living and being awesome surely you're always happy?

The catch is that you have to do 100 days in a row and not skip ANY!

I started on Friday and things were going great- I made two batches of home made chilli sauce before I took the bear out to the local weekly street party (jump up) and danced and looked at BBQd meat (its tough pretending to be a vegetarianist) and mingled with strange strangers...

On Saturday life greeted me with a hangover but I took it as an opportunity to take a day off my boat work (which i made up for with sweet corn fritters for breaky) and go for a flipping long kayak to investigate the neighboring bays and collect shells and lick unsuspecting locals and then invite people over for a pizza night...

 

And then Day 3 almost got the better of me...  I woke up with food poisoning and, when I finally felt safe to leave the bathroom, I spent the whole day grinding, sanding and aciding rust off our lovely steel boat- it was hard to smile... And it took so long I almost gave up on the idea of a kayak ashore to run on the beach... but even though the sun had set and there was the whole "never go to the beach after dark" safety thing, it redeemed my day and led me to pop in at a neighboring boat to borrow an egg (and somehow the egg survived the paddle) to salvage our black (no I'm not racist) bananas and transform them into banana bread [that I burned]... 

Only 3 days in and I nearly failed... 97 days of happiness lie ahead - and Im going to make them good!!! I reckon you should do it too... Life's too short to avoid happiness!

Coke cola use to use the phrase "open happiness" - but I've met too many people who have opened too much if their happiness and unfortunately canned happiness is not the real thing, it just makes you fat!!

2014s obviously going to be the best year ever - make sure you make it a happy one!

Why not lick an unsuspecting stranger today??

Murdering a Gypsy

A little part of myself died earlier today. And not just the skin cells I lost in the shower. No, it goes way deeper than that!

As I tidied the garage this morning (or mostly just moved a lot of stuff around to find other stuff) I found little trinkets from around the world: beer labels from the ‘stans, a rock from the Great Wall, Rubies (that may just be dirt really) from mining in Cambodia, a hat from Greece, t-shirts from Burma and Thailand and Australia, napkins from Vietnam, … the list goes on… and on… and on some more.  Now you might be thinking (as my housemates do) that I own a lot of junk, and I do, but each piece of junk bought back a billion memories. And that is actually quite a lot of memories.

Somewhere in Turkmenistan...

Somewhere on the great wall of china...

a 12m drop into the ground with nothing but dirt holes to climb with somewhere in Cambodia...

The hat was purchased in Greece, the cow was not

I also found many other hats in the garage... this was the better of the lot

I do regret not buying one of these in Burma... (the necklaces, not the woman)

I’ve been living in Cape Town for 2 months today and it’s really starting to freak me out! It’s been more than a month since I’ve licked anything. I’ve had a shower almost every day. I’ve been in the same country for almost 6 months… I fear I might have murdered my gypsy!

I love my job (I get to swing through trees and meet psychopaths and make people smile – who wouldn’t love that?), and love my housemates, and my neighbours, and flipping love Cape Town, and I’ve even come to love my bicycle… but… I’m feeling so guilty about stifling my wanderlust and suffocating the gypsy inside…

The housemates (and family) somewhere in Cape Town...

It’s a horrendous place be in, being torn between two epic lives. It’s almost like having Tom Cruise and Rowan Atkinson both wanting to marry you. I want both and I want both now (life scenarios, not afore mentioned ‘men’)… But with a real job comes real responsibilities. And only 15 days of leave. And with gypsism comes freedom, adventure, breathtaking phenomena’s and not much else.

I am pretty sure this would be an illegal pet in South Africa

Even beautiful beaches have their flaws

I do love that South Africa has real toilets!

Unable to decide between them, I’m living in Limbo. In the lounge. Trying my best not to acquire any more belongings. Changing my mind at least 17 times a day. One minute I decide to go and cycle around Europe, the next I decide to push for regional manager, and then I think I might go climb Everest, but Cape Town too is full of beautiful mountains.  There’s South America and Antarctica or Canada or Japan or starting a company or … ahhhhhhhhhhhh… it’s all so frustrating these first world problems.

AHHHHHHHHHH!

So do I hibernate/ murder/ retire the gypsy or bring her back to life?  

One thing’s for sure though; no matter what I do (and yes, I am open to all suggestions, thoughts, comments, and slaps across the face), life is freaking short – and I want to make it count. I hope you’re doing the same!