Another feather in the cap of Christianity

Some bloke paints a painting which some other people don’t like, how should you respond?

Let’s ask Nazareth Baptist (Shembe) Church spokesman Enoch Mthembu, shall we?

A person who committed such a serious sin deserves to be stoned to death.

And why?

That is according to the church constitution, the Bible, which guides us.

Right.

Cue outraged comments that Enoch doesn’t speak for every Christian.

Oh. OK. Just the ones that are guided by the Bible then, yes?

RAM: What it is, how it’s used, and why you shouldn’t care

I’ve been playing with my new Samsung Galaxy P7500 tablet and I noticed that I was already critically short (my words) on RAM, despite having nothing of huge significance running. It seemed that the device was using about 80% of its available RAM just to run.

I was naturally concerned.

At times of natural concern, we all have someone to whom we turn. Lois Lane had Superman, Commissioner Gordon had Batman, I have The Guru. My initial attempts to raise him by projecting a giant Android symbol onto the moon failed due to intermittent cloud cover over the Southern Suburbs, so I sent him an email instead, asking whether I should perhaps employ some sort of task manager to manage my tasks.

His reply was enlightening:

No – it’s a bad idea, which in almost all cases slows your phone.
Windows people use them, but there are extensive treatises, including by Google engineers, explaining how Linux/Android uses memory, and how task managers screw up the OS’s attempts to do so efficiently.

The “not much RAM to spare” is exactly the Windows-thinking I am talking about. Unused RAM is wasted RAM for Android.
If you want to read more:

http://www.androidcentral.com/ram-what-it-how-its-used-and-why-you-shouldnt-care

I was enlightened. Literally.

If you have an Android device, the article above makes very interesting reading and it is at a suitable level for you and I (ie. basic). The comments, less so on both counts, as geeks take each other on in who can use the most confusing terminology, much of which includes parentheses.

Suffice to say that The Guru has allayed my fears that I have purchased a dud device (which, I have to point out, never faltered in its service to me). I can now enjoy my tablet with a relaxed and untroubled mind.

Viva, The Guru. Viva!

Amazing timelapse of Eihatsu Maru saga

While all the rest of SA is going on about defaced paintings and whether the North West Province is about to descend into a mini race war, I’ve been marvelling at this timelapse of Eihatsu Maru – the “Clifton trawler”.

Yes. I know that this is now (literally) last week’s news, but, when comparing last week’s news with this week’s news, I think I’d rather still be there.

In the words of the videographer:

What was supposed to be a single time lapse of the ship getting pulled out, ended up turning into a four day documentation of the entire event.

There were three attempts to pull the ship out, two of them failing with the rope snapping and the third being a success. The diesel on the Japanese trawler, which was also carrying fish, had to be pumped into a bladder on the beach to decrease its weight, making it easier to pull out. It ended up being quite a lengthy operation involving teams of specialised staff to operate and to offload machinery, and to coordinate the event.

The diesel was offloaded, a stronger towing point was welded to the rear of the ship and she was pulled out at high tide on Friday the 18th May 2012.

A DAFF investigation has shown that the vessel was not engaged in any illegal fishing.

Bloody cheek

Here’s something interesting from today’s Cape Times, concerning the shark-spotting programme operating on some of Cape Town’s beaches.
Lest we forget, this programme is in place to warn those using the ocean when there is an increased danger of a shark attack, like the one last month at (the unguarded) Kogel Bay.

That particular attack came while research into False Bay’s shark population was underway and, of course, there were immediate and vociferous allegations that the two were linked, although this was later rubbished by independent experts. However, the surfing community is still generally unhappy about humans dumping blood into the sea because that attracts sharks which then allegedly eat the surfers. You can see this unhappiness here, with quotes such as:

I don’t like the idea of chumming. 20 years ago, we never saw a shark at Muizenberg. Now we see them regularly.

and:

…anything that brings sharks closer to humans isn’t good.

It seems that surfers are obviously concerned about the danger of shark attacks. Who knew?

All of which brings me back to that Cape Times article today. Aside from a few stats on the shark-spotter programme, it also mentioned some natural chumming:

An injured pygmy sperm whale beached itself at Surfers Corner in Muizenberg on Saturday and the red warning flag was kept up to caution the public that its blood could attract the presence of sharks.
The red flag indicates a recent sighting and a high shark alert.

And how did the surfers react?

hundreds of surfers remained in the water to take advantage of good waves.

So really, how bothered are surfers about chumming? Not much, it seems, when a DYING WHALE FULL OF SHARK ATTRACTANT is spewing its load into False Bay right next to their Mecca, they just carry on surfing.
Why on earth would they do that? Let’s ask an expert, surfer Gary Kleynhans, who was there on Saturday:

The surf is cooking! I understand the shark spotter programme is a safety measure and I appreciate that. But if surfers want to go surfing, they will.

I’ve been doing some rudimentary calculations and it seems to me that when a bloke chucks a bucket full of blood into the sea, that will attract great whites, but if a whale beaches and releases a whaleful of blood into the sea, that won’t.

Especially if the surf is “cooking”.

Am I alone is seeing a slight dichotomy here?

Spooked

Dodging between hefty showers, and wrapped up rather warmly, we indulged Alex’s wish to take a walk around the Aguhas Ghost Trail. We had a great time in the hills above the village, but what I had thought would be a kilometre wander with the kids, turned into a 4.5km trail through dense bush, up and down valleys and over some distinctly iffy terrain.
The kids had a great time, although, due to an unfortunate miscommunication (I think) between Mum and Kristen during a loo stop, the latter ended up rather damp. She also got a nasty blister on her foot and so I ended up carrying her through dense bush, up and down valleys and over some distinctly iffy terrain. She’s not light and the going was not easy. She was also rather damp.
Once we eventually managed to get back down onto the road, I had to run back and get the car as the kids were totally knackered. And thus, we arrived at the Agulhas chippy with me covered in sweat and urine. Delightful.
However, a quick change before a late lunch of geelbek & chips and all was well with the world again.

The views and wildlife up there were amazing. But next time, knowing a bit more what to expect, we’ll certainly be better prepared.
One other good bit of news is that even though I’m not supposed to be running for another fortnight, my calf seems to have not been horribly torn again by my exertions. Happy days.
I’ll sort the photos out tomorrow.