Day 90 - black discs

These little babies I have owned for a long, long time. I can’t recall the exact date of their genesis 

(you may notice that as being a theme in these posts) but I definitely recall them being around 

during my schools days. (So since I’m 23, that must be at least … *does quick mental maths* … 5 years.) When I got them, I remember thinking they were quite large and adventurous but they’re rather modest by modern-day Kim standards. 

We continued our "impress an American" mission today with trips to Haute Cabrière and Dieu Donné and then a drive across Ou Kaapse Weg to Noordhoek. We were going to go along Chapman's Peak Drive as well, to really show off what Cape Town has to offer, but unfortunately it was closed due to mud slides. Stupid winter. But Main Road along the coast has ok views too. I think Slaapstad brought it sufficiently impressively.

Day 89 - long butterflies

I have no idea how I came by these. They just sort of were there in my collection. I probably stole them from my sister. But possession is nine-tenths of the law so booya, they're mine now.

Today they went touristing in the wine lands. I know I do that a lot but this time I had a valid excuse: I had an American to impress with the awesomeness that is my country. So we checked out the big cats park at Vredenheim and then lunch and the birds of prey sanctuary at Spier. I think it was a good showing.

Day 88 - swirls

I love these. And I especially love this picture with the shadows. Very Escher-esque. I haven't worn them in ages coz the ring snapped off the one on the left which made me super sad. But now I've fixed it so I can wear them again! Yay me.

Day 87 - black stones circles

Another pair I think I bought as part of a set. Nothing particularly interesting about them but neither are they so undistinguished as to be spurned as true Kim earrings. They is what they is.

To make a tenuous connection (which I've done before so there is precedent), they sport some "stones" (pretty sure they're actually glass). Something else that sports stones is an engagement ring. Which brings me neatly (if somewhat obscurely and with a wildly improbable leap of logic) to the topic of Beyonce's "Single Ladies". OK, so actually it doesn't at all. It's just that I saw this video today of that dance synced up to the theme tune from "Duck Tales" and I need everyone I know to have seen it. Day made.

http://goodfriendspodcast.tumblr.com/post/119921659418/single-ladies-synced-up-with-the-ducktales-theme

Day 86 - double stars

These are actually two pairs that I'm pretty sure came as a set and that I often wear together. The long ones my cat particularly likes because when they catch the light just right they send fairies skittering all over the place, which he likes to chase.

Day 85 - purple springs

I bought these from Meltz in Fourways a fair few number of years ago. In fact, as I now recall, I bought them at the same time as I bought my pink thread earrings. And the only reason I bought those in the first place (because I didn't think pink was my colour and the earrings are a little small) was because they came with a pair of giant silver hoops.

The reason the one on the right is longer is that it got caught on something when I pulling it out of a bag and it stretched and I can't seem to convince it to go back to its original shape.

Day 84 - copper strips

I bought these at the craft market at Spier a couple of months ago because they perfectly matched my hair colour. Entirely valid reason for buying earrings I think.

By rights, I should be wearing some lilac earrings since today is the Glorious 25th of May (do you know where your lilac towel is?). But I don't think I have any lilac earrings. I better go shopping.

Day 83 - DNA

I bought these, along with another pair that will inevitably be featured elsewhere in this blog, from the Richard Dawkins Foundation website. Obviously this is not the first place you’d think to look for earrings and certainly I had gone there to find a book rather than jewellery. But since there was jewellery on offer, and quite pretty stuff too, I had to buy it. They’re a little on the small side so I wear them with a pair of giant hoops to make up for that. But I like the double helix so they stick around.

Day 82 - Greek circles

These were a present from overseas (from Greece, in fact, as some of the more observant readers may have guessed) from myself. By that I mean that they were from a friend who is so similar to me in various respects that we suspect we are actually the same person. This is not a unique phenomenon: my sister has at least three people who are actually her.

Today (well, tonight, to be completely accurate), they were witness to what I can only describe as an entirely unique evening. I am willing to bet huge amounts of money that no one has ever had the evening we just experienced. I shall not name and shame because I'm a lady, but suffice it to say that the night involved a Mercedes, many bottles of Rickety Bridge Chardonnay and a lot of snort laughing.

Day 81 - small black butterflies

I wore my butterfly shirt again today as the weather was steadfastly pretending it isn't May in Cape Town and was wonderfully summery. So naturally I needed some more butterfly earrings. These are not as large as those from Day 22, but they still count.

They ... and I, obviously ... went to Stardust this evening, which was a fun new experience for me. The food was fantastic and the acts were (mostly) seriously good. Definitely worth the price of admission (which, admittedly, is not low). The whole experience was enhanced by a hilarious episode in which three people tried, individually, to light an electric candle with a lighter. I laughed my eyeliner off.

Day 80 - purple tassels

These are a popular pair. I like them because they're purple and showy; everyone else likes them because, well, because they're purple and showy. They're also very light, obviously, being made of thread but they're big enough that I can't forget I'm wearing them. I do that sometimes with some of my smaller earrings and then have a mild panic attack because without earrings, I'm basically naked.

Day 79 - amethyst

These were, if I remember correctly, a present from my grandparents many aeons ago. Amethyst is the stone – a favourite of mine because … well, because it’s purple, essentially. I have a soft spot for purple, another taste that runs in my family. These are quite little by my standards and so don’t get the airtime they probably deserve because they are very pretty. When I do wear them these days I tend to pair them with a large hoop of some kind to “frame” them (read: make them look bigger).

Day 78 - African thread drops

Another thread pair! And less threadbare than the pink ones, too.

I really like these - the colours are a different mix from my usual palette. They always get a lot of comments too, because they are rather large and the colours are pretty distinctive.

I can't precisely recall but something about them makes me think they might also be Ginger Mary. It's that sort of colour mix.

Day 77 - lions

These were definitely a present from my mum. I think she bought similar ones for each of my sisters as well. It makes sense for me to have lion earrings because wildlife and the bush are very important to me. In fact, I start to get twitchy if I don't have a trip to the bush and a few game drives every couple of months. I used to do day trips to Pilanesberg with my aunt quite regularly when I lived in Jozi but I haven't found a good place to go in Cape Town. I have to content myself with our annual trip to Lusotie Lodge in Mjejane and try to plan my leave around when my parents have their timeshare week at Kwa Maritane.

Day 76 - pink dangly things

I can't remember exactly, but I think these are from my favourite earring shop, Frozen Lemons in Kenilworth Centre. I have bought many a pair from there, both for myself and for other people. They stock lots of funky, different earrings.

Speaking of funky and different, I was coerced into buying some very strange things at the Milnerton market today, which will soon be earringified and duly displayed on this very blog. You have been warned.

I love wandering through the Milnerton market because people sell the weirdest stuff. If you invest a couple of hours and are willing to dig through a lot of very odd bits, you can often unearth absolute gems. It was certainly fruitful for us today as we searched for steampunk decorations for our production of Midsummer Night's Dream. This is really going to be a fantastic production.

Day 75 - black chains

Today's earrings were very carefully chosen. I wore my Metallica t-shirt today which in usual circumstances would mean that I wore the earrings I made specifically to go with that shirt. However, suddenly the challenge presents its first real obstacle: I have already worn my guitars in this challenge. So I had to choose another pair to match my shirt. Quelle horreur! But after a long contemplation of the available trinkets, I happened upon this pair, which seemed to me to fit the bill rather nicely.

Day 74 - tinkly hoops

A bit of a rarity in the Kim collection: a pair of hoops I will deign to wear by themselves, because they are interesting enough to warrant classification as a pair unto themselves. They certainly make a lovely tinkling sound when I toss my head, which tends to happen far more often when the result is musical. I'm a veritable show pony on tinkly earring days. (Nobody may EVER quote me on that ...)

A bit of a late post today, I do apologise - some unspeakable people kept me out far longer than I intended as I had to lock up after they had finished demolishing the bar stock. To be fair, early (for me at any rate) rehearsal tomorrow (today?) notwithstanding, I probably would not have gone to bed before now anyway. That's just not how Fridays work.

Day 73 - silver discs with black beads

I bought these from my mum's friend's son's girlfriend at the time. They're possibly a little too little to really shoulder the weight of the unwieldy title I've given them but if I'd called them what I call them in my head (Kim's earrings, because the aforementioned mum's friend's son's girlfriend was also named Kim), that would probably have confused my doubtless by now millions of avid readers.

Day 72 - Chinatown chains

Yet another Chinatown pair today. What I particularly love about Chinatown earrings (aside from their wondrous cheapness for which I and my continued financial solvency are eternally grateful) is that they are generally fantastically simple designs and yet are very effective and pretty. Since I acquired my desk vice, I have become more and more taken with the idea of making a proper go of making earrings, beyond the adding of earring hooks to random decorations that I've done to date. But because my artisanal skills are woefully underpractised, I must needs look to simple designs to begin with, so my Chinatown subcollection is very useful. (As, I have embarrassingly recently discovered, is Pinterest.)

Day 71 - seahorses

I had to buy these when I found them because at the time I didn't have any seahorses. Which is just wrong. That situation is now rectified both with these and with some more colourful ones I made myself out of Two Oceans Aquarium keyrings (not yet blogged - stay tuned!).

The reason I needed seahorses is because of a YouTube video my roommate and I watched over and over and over of an animated gecko:

We even had a hand sign and wave. We're normal.

Day 70 - fishies

I love these even though they are really quite small. When they're worn with a pair of hoops, they look like they're in fishbowls and that amuses me.

Day 69 - sparkly snakes

Now, now. No silly jokes about day 69 involving snakes, please. We're all much more mature than that ...

In all seriousness, these were a present from Santa last year I think. Santa has very odd taste in earrings when it comes to presents to me. Not odd in my opinion, you understand, but odd in that I bet he never gives earrings like that to any other person.

These snakes had a grand old time today as we all headed out into the dunes of Hout Bay for a promotional photo shoot for Midsummer Night's Dream, which, I MAY have mentioned in passing a couple of times, I shall be appearing in at the Masque Theatre in June. Dude, this thing is gon' be HAWT!

Keep an eye out - previews shall be appearing soon.

Day 68 - blue feathers

I've had these for absolute ages, but, as is hardly unusual, I'm not entirely sure where they came from. They haven't been worn for ages and wearing them now even inspired me today to try something new: we went to the big cat park and restaurant at Vredenheim. My sister bitched a lot about the tiny size of the cats' enclosures, which are small, but the cats were gorgeous:

So was the venue:

Day 67 - blue triangle diamonds

Really like these and really have no clue where I got them. Another 1-2-3-2-1 diamond formation with many shades of blue. At the risk of sounding like Chandler Bing, could these BE any more Kim?

Day 66 - gold and black diamonds

Another Woolies pair, I suspect. Simple, but quite nice all the same. And a little bit of an unusual purchase for me since they are gold. But I did put them on at 6 o'clock in the morning, so it makes an awful amount of sense that they're a little unusual. I suppose I'm lucky they weren't socks by mistake.

The reason for the ungodly hour of my dressing was that I had to go to Home Affairs. Which I duly did ... for seventeen and a half hours. Or maybe it was only three. I don't remember, because it was before 10 o'clock in the morning. But eventually we made it to the front of the interminably long queue and applied for a new passport. Hooray! One step closer to my Kenya trip coming up later this year. I have seen pictures of the earrings available for purchase in Kenya. I shall be saving my ... erm, whatever the currency of Kenya is.

They also attended a very successful (I thought) and certainly highly enjoyable and highly jiggly rehearsal for Midsummer Night's Dream, which, as I've mentioned, I shall be performing in later this year. Next month in fact. Holy crap.

Day 65 - pink drops

A much-loved and oft-worn pair of earrings today, as evidenced by the fact that all the pink's starting to chip off. I particularly like to wear these as pictured - one pointing up and the other pointing down - because it annoys a lot of people. They very seldom stay with all the drops on one earring pointing all the same way anyway. This pair really does appear to have a mind of its own sometimes.

Day 64 - black hearts

Though I have bought many of my earrings from regular chain stores, I don’t often run into people whose earrings I recognise as being a pair that I too own. This is an exception. One of the designers I work with often wears a pair identical to this, although I think we've yet to both wear them on the same day. They may look rather impressive size-wise, but they’re constructed of wood so are very light. Useful if you live in Cape Town since carved wood is less likely to kill you when whipped into your face by a vengeful south-easter than, say, scalloped steel or sterling silver.

Day 63 - blue stars

Another pair I rediscovered when I went through the little pot next to my bed. I nearly lost one this morning because the butterfly flew away and the earring went down in the parking lot as I walked to my office. Luckily I noticed so I could go back for it.

I didn't actually think of it this morning when I put these on (because I'm never entirely compos mentis before 10 o'clock in the morning), but these are an entirely apt pair for me to have worn today because of course it's Star Wars day:

Some of you may have noticed the complete absence of a post yesterday so I probably should explain. You see, after a surprisingly long time in which I had things on every day of the week including weekends, yesterday I finally had a proper Sunday. That means I didn't get dressed and spent the day drinking tea, doing crosswords and listening to BBC radio. (Yes, I am an old lady in training.) Of course since I didn't get dressed, I certainly didn't wear any earrings. I don't know whether that counts as cheating on the challenge, skipping a day like that, but  I'm not about to apologise for what turned out to be a thoroughly productive day (I finished three crosswords, listened to a lovely adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens, complete with cameo appearances by the authors, watched the whole second series of Creature Comforts and had a lovely long chat with my aunt). So really I can't really bring myself to worry about it overmuch.

Day 62 - purple spikes

I was going through the little pot next to my bed this morning and found about 11 pairs of earrings I had totally forgotten I own, this one among them. I need to find a way to display these with the rest of the collection so I remember to wear them from time to time. Or never again during the course of the challenge as the case now is with these. Huh. Guess I could just put them back in the pot, really.

Day 61 - gypsy blue

I bought these a couple of years ago ... actually, I just Googled it and it wasn't "a couple". It was 10. Fuck, I'm old.

Anyway, I bought these for MCQP back in 2005 when it was held at Ratanga Junction and the theme was "Circus". My sister bought a similar pair in purple and we dressed as gyspy fortune tellers. We were in no way contenders for best dressed. Some of our companions were dressed as trapeze artists, complete with net, and even they were far behind some of the amazing costumes on display that night. MCQP never fails to impress in that regard.

That was a fun evening (and night ... and morning). You haven't quite lived until you've been on the Congo Queen quite pissed and with a number of people high on various types of substances.