Oh look, one extra seat! No space for The Editor then, Charlie V? Please also note Charlie V in the back left, laughing arrogantly as he knows that he has once again left me land bound.

Being of quite a pedigree, myself and the SLXS team don’t only resign ourselves to one form of transport. We obviously make loads of use of the now infamous VR3 and you will soon be hearing of The Bomber and The Benz. I also like to cycle my Kona mountain bike around Tokai forest, and not too long ago I found myself taking a train trip to The Brass Bell in Kalk Bay.

However, we would not be the home of excess if we were to resign oursleves to just travelling by land. We also find ourselves up high, with the birds, in the skies of Cape Town. We literally have Cape Town covered, and you can’t go anywhere without us not being there or not having been there. So it was with some nostalgia that Charlie V was scrolling through some old photos on his laptop while we sat in my lounge watching Top Gun. The lounge doubles as the office/bar/entertainment section. So while we sat there watching Iceman, Goose and Maverick battling in the skies and saying various alarming things such as “I’m too close for missiles, I’m switching to guns!” and the captain shouting “Son, your ego is writing cheques your body cant cash!” we found some old photos of Charlie V’s day at the airstrip.

I was stunned though when I saw a photo of The Green Point Stadium from up in a helicopter. As you know, the stadium has now been knocked down so that a bigger, better one can replace it for the 2010 World Cup, which is going to make Cape Town even better than it already is. It’s unbelievable that this place is going to go up another notch, I can’t quite get my head around that yet. It’s the city of dreams, the place I call home and the place I roam.

So anyway, I saw this photo of the stadium and asked Charlie V when it was taken. Charlie casually said “Don’t you remember, that was when we watched the Coca Cola Colab concert last year? Metallica and all those bands played”

Um…right…ok…let me get around this.

So while Charlie V was messing about in the sky, I was sitting down in the stadium, panting like a tired dog, sweating like I was stuck in the Sahara, and Charlie V was just having a merry go round Cape Town in the helicopter. Right, what is wrong in this equation?

I was not in the helicopter!

“Yeah you should have told me about that hey, I thought you were part of my entourage. You know, the four of us do everything together” I said, with the look of a sad little deer.

“Yeah but there was no space, it was also a last minute plan”

Well I tell you what, next time if you can’t fit the whole SLXS entourage in the helicopter, then don’t go! Or get another two or three helicopters. We can’t run the home of excess like this. We cannot go on like this, we are losing sight of the whole dream if we don’t take the whole entourage with!

Anyway, I forgave Charlie V and let him off. This time. Next time he will not get off lightly at all.

So basically what we see in these photos is a photo of Charlie V in the Robertson R44(Think this is correct, Charlie V has a habit of mixing things up) helicopter. Please also note that I am missing from this photo. Yes, while he was having the time of his life, I was waiting in the Green Point stadium waiting for bands like Seether and Metallica to play.So he went for a lovely ride, and then later on came to watch the concert. Tough life.

I must stress that the whole time he was flying, I was sweating profusely, like I was coming off some sort of insane drug addiction. Like Hunter S Thompson sweated while going through Las Vegas.

The other photo is of Charlie in front of a Harvard, quite an intense looking plane. I’m thinking of calling Charlie V a naval aviator, in tribute to our men from Top Gun.

Charlie V with the Harvard-Please note the arrogant smile as if to say “Where are you Mr Editor?!”

Obviously the photo from the sky is of the stadium. You will see me down there somewhere. Sweating. Swearing. Wondering why I, as the editor of this whole thing, as the captain of the ship, as the pilot of this plane, as the master of disaster, as the king of bling, was stuck down there by myself, alone and wondering “Where is Charlie V? He is late for the concert.”

The Green Point stadium from up in the chopper. This stadium no longer exists, making way for a 2010 World Cup Stadium

I also wanted to be doing flips in the sky. Did no one even consider me? I wanted to be like Tom Cruise. I wanted to be in the sky. I wanted to feel like a bird. I wanted to be wearing Ray Ban aviators, a leather jacket, a crisp white Dockers T-shirt, a nice pair of indigo Ernest Sewn jeans and an arrogant look on my face.

I wanted to, after the flight, get on my motorbike like Tom Cruise. At this point, an absolute stunner of a girl, who had ignored me all these previous years, would run up to my bike, wanting to chat. Wanting to rekindle the romance(That was never there). Wanting to just love me. I would be way too arrogant for this.

She would be shouting in my ear “Sean. Sean! SEAN!”

I would just continue revving my bike to the red line, and I would then cup my hand to my ear, shout “I CAN”T HEAR YOU!” and take off into the sunset, leaving her dream shattered.

That’s what I wanted. And that’s not what I got. I suppose you win some and you lose some.

Thats the respect I get for being the leader of this rat pack.

Sean Lloyd

Editor