Right now, one can only wonder what people in Zimbabwe are doing for fun.

Electricity comes on very late at night and is turned off long before dawn. Announcements about foreign currency have added to the abba jabba doo effect – and have not been conducive to coherent thought about racing or anything else.

Although I might get up at 3 am to cook the dogs’ food, I am unwilling to crouch over my PC, in the middle of the night in mid-winter, to check out form. Of course, I could, with a magnifying glass, study past form printed in the back of the official race cards, but that’s another mind-boggling exercise.

There are eight races at Borrowdale Park this Sunday – the first due off at 12.55 pm – and no doubt we can look forward to some exciting finishes and the usual race day fun. However, as far as predictions go, you are on your own.

Strangely, perhaps, racegoers seem to like tips and previews. Regular punters, I suspect, don’t take too much notice, apart from thinking, ”What is he, she or it smoking now?” Those who don’t take their racing as seriously may miss the usual build-up but do not worry…your guesses this time will be as good, if not better, than mine.

Several of the carded runners on Sunday have been nominated for the 1900m Republic Cup (the last of Borrowdale’s big three) on July 13. Many raced at the last meeting on June 15 so, if desperate, get up very early and view the race videos which have been posted on the Mashonaland Turf Club website.

In the meantime, I will spend my day reading books I have read before as an alternative to digging up the garden. Life without Twitter and WhatsApp etc is quite awful but noisy generators are not my thing.