Nice quiet day today - woke up late with the trains going past and ambled out to do some leisurely shopping. All the things that we'd forgotten in London - like phone & camera chargers either accidently packed in storage, or left in the hotel!

One highlight of the day was the drive to drop Carol off at work, as we're borrowing her car. A conversation on the radio brought home to me how different South Africa is from Europe. DJ : "This the breakfast show - we have a caller with a traffic update from the Southern suburbs. Hello? Maisie?"

"Gareth?," comes the faint voice with a very strong Cape accent. "Can joo hear me?"

"Ja, faintly," he replies. "What's your update?"

"OK darling", she says. "The phone's stuck in my ear, but I'm pulling over onto the curb now. Jislaak, that's better. Anyway listen my love, joo must tell people to avoid the Main Rd near Observatory. There's a ouk in a red car, and another crazy ouk in a white taxi. They're tearing up and down - the wrong way down the road, driving and shooting all over the place. It's pandemonium - I think folks should stay away for at least 15 minutes."

"OK thanks," he says - as coolly as if he'd been told that the M25 was a bit slow on Junction 19. "I'll make sure that we let the police know. thanks for calling."

"Thanks my love," says Maisie - sounding only slightly stressed, "and can you please play something by Bryan Adams?"

It was bizzare. Anyway - I wound up my window, locked the car door, and drove back home listening to the Canadian rock-crooner singing "Can't Stop this Thing We've Started"... and still feeling slightly bemused - mainly by the fact that 15 minutes later, this main commuter road would apparently be back to normal.