As viewed from the bedroom window this morning:
and as shared on my Instagram feed almost immediately afterwards.
Or… er… not.
Interesting discussions yesterday over the potential validity (none) of the conspiracy theories surrounding the Boston bombings.
I’m not going to link to any of them – you can go google “loony tunes, boston bombings” if you want to read more.
However, I was sent this at the height of the manhunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev:
You can click the picture for a larger version with bigger writing
Or… er… not.
Much like those annoying Sunday Times or City Press headlines, everyone remembers the story, and you can slip in a quiet retraction on page 79 (or not if you prefer) which 0.1% of the people who read the original make-believe will read, leaving 99.9% of the population believing that what you said was true.
My publishing the above image is just a little personal stand against that modus operandi and should serve as a reminder that you shouldn’t believe everything you read on the internet – not least the people who are telling you not to believe everything that you read on the internet.
I recognise the fact that some people may find me slightly hypocritical in suggesting, here on the internet, that you shouldn’t believe the people on the internet who are telling you not to believe everything you read on the internet, but really, you just shouldn’t.
Question everything. Except me.
Had it
As summer breathes its final breath and dies its final death, barely hanging on here in the Cape with a measly high of 28°C expected today, the bad news is that we still have a mosquito problem. Specifically in my bedroom last night. This is the downside of Cape Town summer for me and I will consider it a GoodThing™ when the cold comes and kills off the last of those little bastards.
It could be worse though.
Worse because right on our doorstep, a child is dying from malaria every minute. We’re lucky that SA is pretty much a malaria-free country, but every year, malaria kills 650,000 – mostly pregnant women and children under five – which is a huge, huge number, especially since malaria is a disease that is both preventable and treatable.
I’ve actually had malaria: thankfully, I didn’t die from it. But even then, it’s a wholly unpleasant and debilitating disease. It’s not something you want, even when you know it’s going to get treated.
Tomorrow – April 25th 2013 – is World Malaria Day and one way you can help out is by buying a bracelet from Relate Bracelets, a social enterprise which has partnered with United Against Malaria Bracelet for R30.
Fairly funky, I reckon, although I freely admit to not being a huge bracelet expert. I’m going to get my daughter one because she’ll love it and I’m going to get my son one, because he has that kind of surfer boy look when it’s sunny and the mozzies are out.
Funds sold from this bracelet go to The Global Fund, which distributes nets (I need this), indoor sprays and provides access to medication.
You can get your bracelet at selected Game and Tiger’s Eye curio stores (Indaba and Out of Africa) or if you are agoraphobic, online through Digital Mall.
Do your bit, get a bracelet and make a difference.
Admin
Apologies for the near radio silence on here at the moment.
I have been working on some stuff behind the scenes here and also struggling under a mountain of admin elsewhere in my life.
Hopefully, it should be all over in the near future. (The admin, not my life.)
Also, I’ve just seen an advert on TV for avantsa.co.za and now I want to buy (at least) one of everything on there. Especially the 700 series, obviously.
More tomorrow.
Youtube videos not playing on Chrome – Solved
I’ve been having a few issues with Youtube videos not playing in my Google Chrome browser. Instead, I just get a black screen and misery. I could, however, get those same videos to play on Internet Explorer.
This situation was beginning to irk me, so I did some rudimentary exploration around my Chrome place and found out that it was a Flash player plugin conflict which was causing the problem.
Having found that out, this is how I solved it.
- Check your plugins by typing chrome://plugins/ into the URL bar.
- Look for the Adobe Flash Player plugin. You may see that it says (2 files) after the plugin name. Therein lies your problem:
- I found that the easiest way around this was to Disable one of those files.
- To do that, look to the top right hand corner of the plugins tab and click the little + Details link.
- This will open up the individual files each of which will have a Disable link.
- Choose one to disable and… er… disable it. It will become greyed out.
- Restart your Chrome browser and test by looking at a page with a Youtube video on it.
Like this one, for example.
And there you go. Please leave thanks, comments and cold, hard cash in the comments section below.
Happy Youtubing.