Category: learning curve

Have I Got Hues For You

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UPDATE: On seeing this, I realise the photo is a bit fuzzy. But then, so is the dog. Accuracy abounds and needs must.

I had a wonderful Isle of Man related quota photo lined up for today, but the will have to wait, because we’re struggling with internet connectivity today.

The reason for this outage can be seen in the photo below. Attached to the front end of the dog (I’m no expert, but I think it’s the other end from the kinked tail) are the teeth that chewed through the Telkom junction box, effectively cutting us off from the rest of the world.

“Least said, soonest mended,” he seethed.

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The photo above, with all its lovely hues, was taken this morning in Tokai Forest. Tokai Forest was still full of (other people’s) dog mess. Everywhere.

Before we had a dog, I figured that there must be some technical or logistical reason why dog owners didn’t clean up after their pets. Now that I am a dog owner, I realise that it’s just laziness, a lack of responsibility and a complete disregard for other people.
I suppose that it’s good to have that clarified, if nothing else. Tossers.

But while we’re on that (rather distasteful) note, does anyone know how long it takes for a Telkom PZ50 switch to “pass through” a beagle, please?

Beaglegas

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Previously, my email inbox looked fairly normal. Some family stuff, a Superbru reminder or two, a bit of hate mail from some Afrikaners about something I wrote on Steve Hofmeyr in 2007. Nothing particularly unusual there.

Now, however, my email inbox seems to have emails about beagles in it. Often. And some of those emails look like this:

IMG_20140920_135310

Lovely. And WTF is a BeagleKiss? Eww.

It turns out that Beaglegas is yet another drawback of dog ownership. I don’t know if it is any worse than Spanielgas or Poodlegas, but it’s far from the pleasant end of the scale when all you want to do is chill out in front of a game of footy on the TV. There are two main reasons why Beaglegas is more dangerous than the mustard gas used during the First World War: firstly, because it’s unexpected – you’re not on some godforsaken battlefield in the middle of Belgium, you’re on your couch watching an Everton Europa Cup game – and secondly, because it’s colourless, meaning that there is no visual warning of its impending arrival at the gates of your respiratory system.

In addition, there is no incoming shell here: the method of delivery can be as innocuous as a dozing puppy. In fact, I’m rapidly learning that there’s actually nothing innocuous about a dozing puppy at all. Those moments when the dog is calm, and everything (including its back door musculature) is relaxed, are the moments of most danger. But that’s not to say that you are safe from Beaglegas attack during the dog’s waking hours either. Earlier this week, I inadvertently trapped Beaglegas in the kids’ school lunch boxes after an early morning run-by attack in the kitchen. Not nice for anyone. And it dissolved their cheese rolls.

There are several hints and tips available via that BeaglePro email, hints and tips which one can employ to reduce the incidence of Beaglegas. They’re most likely tried and tested by other Beaglegas sufferers and would probably work in reducing the incidence of Beaglegas in your proximity at any given time. However, I can (quite easily) recall a time when there was absolutely zero Beaglegas in my home. That was fewer than two months ago and those were magical, fresher times; times where one could happily breathe deeply, confident in the knowledge that it was going to be nitrogen and oxygen making up the bulk of your inhalation, rather than the manifestation of Satan in aeriform.

In fact, the only individual in our house who seems wholly immune to Beaglegas is Colin. This is strange. Given that Colin’s sense of smell is allegedly somewhere between 20,000 and 50,000 times (depending on which book you read) more sensitive than ours, it should, by rights, have between 20,000 and 50,000 times more effect on her. It should be instantly fatal. Very fatal. In fact, given those astonishing olfactory comparisons, it wouldn’t surprise me – upon exposure to Beaglegas – if Colin was immediately vapourised and she was erased from photos of herself with the family, like Marty McFly in Back To The Future. And Michael J Fox just messed with the passage of time, he sensibly steered well clear of anything as serious as Beaglegas. Lest we forget, when given the alternative methods of powering the infamous DeLorean, he and Doc Brown took one sniff at Beaglegas and opted instead for plutonium stolen from a heavily-armed Libyan terrorist group.

They knew.

And suddenly, I’m in two minds as to whether to publish this post. I need to express my suffering, yes. I require your sympathy and I need other sufferers to understand that they’re not alone. But it concerns me that some terrorist group might read this, have a lightbulb moment and understand the gravitas and power of Beaglegas. They would then get some beagles and completely ignore all the BeaglePro advice in order to produce and harvest vast volumes of BeagleGas before launching a terror attack that would make 9/11 look like a unfortunate incident in a Lego factory.

But then I figure that they could just Google for “most evil things on earth” and somehow find themselves at a page which at least mentions the rectal emissions of tri-colour hounds.
I can’t be the only one who has found cause to write about this heinous compound. Or maybe I am the only one who has managed to put pixels to paper before inevitable asphyxiation.

Footy tonight and footy past

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I’m off to watch South Africa take on African Champions and second-tier Ebola carriers Nigeria at the Cape Town Stadium this evening. It’ll be my fourth time watching the national team and I have yet to see them win.
Or… er… draw, actually.

The first Bafana Bafana game I saw was seven years ago yesterday, as it happens: Zambia in an Afcon qualifier at Newlands. South Africa weren’t very good that day and Chris Katongo scored a hattrick in 11 minutes for Chipolopolo ruining the return of Benni McCarthy from international exile. It finished 1-3. It wasn’t great.

And then, because of the World Cup and the politics of SAFA, we didn’t see another Bafana game in Cape Town until after the World Cup. Then, we got to see them play the USA at the Cape Town Stadium in the Nelson Mandela Challenge in November 2010. South Africa weren’t very good that day, and lost to a second half goal from Juan Agudelo.

We shouldn’t forget the last time I saw them, either. 8th January last year, against a decidedly under-strength (read: “B-team”) Norway. South Africa weren’t very good that day and eventually lost a really, really boring game to Tarik Elyounoussi’s goal just before half time.

South Africa have won one first-class game at the Cape Town Stadium: a 2-0 win against the Central African Republic in March last year. I wasn’t there, but I was reliably informed that the Central African Republic weren’t very good that day. And yes, there were the CHAN games too, but those don’t really count.

So Bafana’s record is fairly unspectacular in Cape Town, and even more so when I’m watching them. New coach Shakes Mashaba has requested everyone to come out and support the team this evening, but if he knew my history with watching his side, he’d probably be less keen to see me there.

The stadium in Sudan was fully packed to capacity. I hope it will also be the case in Cape Town.

Well, no it won’t. I’m not sure what sort of crowd they’re expecting, but I am told that the lower tier has sold out and they’ve opened up the second tier for bookings. That would probably mean somewhere between about 25,000 and 30,000 tops.

I’ll try and snap a few photos this evening and put them on twitter (tonight) and Flickr (maybe tomorrow).

Blackouts likely as power stations close for repairs

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I know, South Africa. We’re used to it now, aren’t we? Electricity shortages, load-shedding, blackouts.

Since the first issues reared their ugly rears back in 2008, it’s become almost second nature to us: now, even the briefest of power cuts is hollered from the rooftops as being a rolling blackout and another demonstration of just how badly our country is behind the rest of the world.
And now, this: the news that four power stations:

…which provide 10% of the country’s electricity, could be offline until the end of the year on safety fears [raising] further concerns about the chances of blackouts during the winter.

Only in South Africa, hey?

Except no. Because this is from a Sky News article about the UK. So let’s drop the exceptionalism and step away from the exceptionalism. Keep your hands where we can see them. etc etc

It’s not new, either. The UK has been warned about this for over a year now.

I’m well aware that two wrongs don’t make a right though, and I’m sure the 120 million odd individuals resident in the UK and SA would much rather have readily available electricity 24/7/365. But in a society where we are so anxious to draw attention to the negatives (and let’s be fair here, there are plenty of negatives to draw attention to), singling out SA as being the only country where the population has to contend with power shortages is plainly incorrect.

And yes, Eskom keep increasing our electricity prices, and that’s very, very annoying, but guess what’s happening elsewhere?

In the UK: Energy bills rise by 37% in 3 years.

In Germany:

Today an average family of four in Germany spends about $107 a month for electricity. This year, their monthly bill will be $129. The price hike is due to an increase in the Renewable Energy Surcharge. The surcharge is one of many government fees, taxes and subsidies that are passed on to average consumers and fund Germany’s renewable energy sector.

That’s a 20.6% increase.

And even in the USA: “We are now in an era of rising electricity prices,” said Philip Moeller, a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

And as for the ludicrous sight of Eskom begging South Africans to use less electricity (cue: “What other organisation asks people to use less of its product?” remarks), well – most other electricity suppliers around the world, actually.
e.g.:

As temperatures plunged to 16 below zero in Chicago in early January and set record lows across the eastern U.S., electrical system managers implored the public to turn off stoves, dryers and even lights or risk blackouts.

We’re not alone. We’re not even vaguely special when it comes to not having enough electricity to go around – how about this for a headline?

New research warns world to prepare for blackout

That’s right – the whole wide world.

It’s time to drop the victim mentality and give up on the self pity. The grass isn’t greener on the other side, or if it is, it’s only because of all the extra s**t over there.

Eskom might not be a world leader in electricity supply and production, but neither, it seems, is anyone else.

UPDATE: And Belgium.

Those M3 roadworks – the details

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Following this post and several (or more) attempts to get some sort of clarity on what exactly was going to be done to the M3 in Cape Town from our elected representative, I finally got an email from Michelle Talliard. Michelle is the Senior Secretary to the Director : Asset Management & Maintenance, no less.

Here’s the skinner:

The road works have begun but they are being done outside of peak hours.  The inbound section is being doing between 09h30 and 16h30 and the outbound section will be done between 08h30 and 15h00.  The Stop/Go is incorrect and will be removed.  There will only be single lane closures in each direction.  The project manager will follow up on the incorrect signage.

The works on the M3 will happen between the Trovato link off ramp and the Klaasens Road Bridge on both carriageways and between Bishopscourt Drive and Boshof Avenue on the inbound carriageway only.

Currently work is taking place on the inbound carriageway between the Klaasens Road Bridge and the Trovato Link off ramp.  Minor works are also taking place on the shoulder between Bishops Court Drive and Paradise Road, but these are not disrupting traffic at the moment.

That first bit – between the Trovato link off ramp and the Klaasens Road Bridge on both carriageways – is not actually a lot of road, as far as I can work out. Basically just over the brow of the Edinburgh Drive hill to the Chart Farm as you’re heading out of town. Still, take away one of the two lanes in either direction and it’s going to mean delays.

The second one – between Bishopscourt Drive and Boshof Avenue on the inbound carriageway only – is longer, but mildly confusing in that neither of those two roads actually intersect with the M3. But I think that they mean between the first set and last set of robots that you encounter on your way into town each morning.

Despite their efforts to keep it out of peak hours, it’s going to make daytime traveling a nightmare, so Rhodes Drive past Kirstenbosch would seem to be the obvious detour for inbound traffic and “something through Claremont and Kenilworth” for stuff heading south. Good luck with that one.

Lastly, if you’ve driven up Edinburgh Drive away from the city recently, you’ll have enjoyed the near-authentic off-road experience twixt Struben Road and the footbridge at the top of the hill. But it would appear that there is to be no rehabilitation work done to this bit of road, despite the fact they will be rehabilitating all around it.

I don’t make the rules.