Watermelons and fat cats.

A very varied day today. Starting off with even more financial opportunities my way - this time an old duck on her death bed has selected me, her "Dear Beloved" to inherit her fortune. While she apparently doesn't know my name, she believes in my inherent goodness and worthiness. Unfortunately, since I don't trust in her inherent goodness, I am not about to pass on my bank account details to her.
But anyway - on to more important things like watermelons. Yes indeed. Today the biggest ever watermelon seen by the head of the Joburg Fresh Produce Market's Watermelon Panel (I never dreamed such a title existed), who is apparently also known as The Watermelon King (this one I can believe!!), arrived at the market.
So off I went to check it out. And there it was. A monstrous 73kg hulk of a fruit. It was a Carolina Cross watermelon grown by a Free State farmer from some seeds his brother in America sent him. Pretty cool. One of the customers bought it for R400 and is going to use it for "advertising purposes". Well. Okay. Like, obviously.

Back to the office for the next task of the day. Not an easy one, unfortunately. I had to track down the salaries earned by the CEO's of our country's biggest parastatals. Sheesh. Where to start, where to start?
I headed off to the business section to find someone with an idea of how to find this information. I now know that in the organisation's annual report, where the financials are listed, you can find a section on directors' earnings. And it's here that this juicy little tidbit is presented it all it's many zeros and accompanying bonuses and such. I now also know that I totally missed the mark in picking a career that would earn me bucks like these guys.
So it seems that the guys who do a good job all earn around the R3 to R4-million a year mark. But the guys who mess up do spectacularly better. Like Kaya Ngqula of SAA who got fired for incompetence. On top of his salary he got paid a R9.3-million bonus to please leave. And Dali Mpofu of the SABC got R11-million to do likewise. Now Eskom's Jacob Maroga, the man who led us into darkness and price hikes, is apparently going to score another R9-million after leaving just in shares that were signed over to him and have yet to pay out.
*sigh*
And still he complains and wants more!