for the love of life

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2012-05-27T12:30:00.001+02:00

Picked up a couple of copies of local Sunday paper, the City Press, this morning. We don't normally buy the paper, as we prefer to read online. Check out the #citypress and #twitpicyourcitypress tags on Twitter to find out why.

Sunday 7:39

2012-05-27T08:00:00.001+02:00

Have a lot of things bouncing around this skull this morning.

Like freedom, and how easily it is lost. And how sad it is when those who fought hardest for it find it so easy to forget what it cost. I cry cry cry for my beloved country, where the presidential penis receives more attention (and money) than the millions of starving children in our country.

Like star stuff. We live in exciting times, and it is still my belief that, in my lifetime commercial flights to the moon/Mars will happen. I plan on living for a very long time :)

Like happiness. Life is short, really, and we should not waste a moment. I do not subscribe to the 'hang in there, things will get better' school of thought, because you do not know how much time you've got left. Telling me things will get better in 6 months from now may actually have a very different reaction from me. Pursue happiness now, and do not accept mediocrity or misery as status quo. And look, before you think I think life is a bed of roses, I don't. It is hard. All life is suffering. But, you can still make the best of it. And if you see someone doing something that increases the general shittiness of life - either for yourself or those around you - speak up and end the shittiness. Do not allow evil to grow. If each of us could stop one evil seed to grow, the world may actually turn out to be a better place.

And then, there were kittens and chocolate and rainbows and ponies and unicorns and candyfloss trees, and they all lived happily ever after.

The end.

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2012-05-26T17:39:00.001+02:00

Sandton sunset

I am writing

2012-05-26T08:44:00.001+02:00

It started with a dream. An odd dream, in which I was captured by tea traders and held as a tea slave along with Katie McGrath (her of Merlin fame). And so, a new story was born.

But, I notoriously struggle to find time to write, as the traditional sit down in front of type writer/computer and write every day just doesn't seem to work for me. I do, however, spend a fair amount of time waiting for people/things, and this is time I could use to write. But I don't always have my computer with me. I do, however, ALWAYS carry my phone. So, it got me.thinking about ways I could write using any platform, and at any time retrieve what I have written.

I tried Evernote previously (nanowrimo 2011), but it just didn't work. In fact, it corrupted so quickly that I lost most of the story and my will to live.

Then I realised that I already have such a platform that abuse almost daily - blogs. I have created another blog, set it to private and voila, I have a writing space. And I have been writing.

I will probably do the same thing with previous WIP, and see if that makes the edits/rewrites easier too.

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2012-05-25T09:55:00.000+02:00

I attended a tech conference for the last 2 days. This interesting sculpture marks the entrance to the area where the conference was held, and I loved the play of light here.

On evil

2012-05-25T07:36:00.001+02:00

I may not be a religious person, but I have very well defined ideas of what is right and what is wrong, and while I may not believe in the devil, I do believe evil exists.

People may do bad things, but this doesn't necessarily mean that they are evil. Things happen, and sometimes people do bad things out of necessity.

But, forcing a good person to do bad things, that is evil. And justifying bad things being done using religion or politics, that is evil.

This is one of the reasons I recently changed employers, and one of the reasons I am struggling to find hope for the country I live in.

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2012-05-24T09:40:00.000+02:00

I winter trees

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2012-05-23T20:51:00.001+02:00

Winter is here.

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2012-05-22T17:39:00.001+02:00

All this hullabaloo about Zuma’s Spear reminded me of this picture I took in Munich earlier this year.

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2012-05-21T17:39:00.000+02:00

Look, Lego.

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2012-05-20T18:53:00.001+02:00

As it is some sort of baking day, I made cheddar and feta muffins.

Full circle

2012-05-20T09:15:00.001+02:00

I was sitting thinking this morning about this blog, it's lifecycle and it's various incarnations over the years. Odd to think I have been blogging in one way or another for over 14 years now, and using this domain for 12 years.

In the beginning, there were very few free blogging hosts, and we had to make do with the likes of Diaryland (or is that Dairyland?) and - oh gods - Geocities. By the time I registered this domain, my little net addiction had led me to a new career in IT, and, as a sideline hobby, I picked up a little bit of coding knowledge and wrote my own website. I discovered the joys of Blogger's Blog this kinky, which allowed me to quickly publish articles and thoughts, and integrated that with my own website - because blogger allowed for a self-hosted option where it would FTP the bits you published to a server of your choice. I worked at a ISP/hosting sp at the time, and arranged for a staff web server with *cough* no selfish motives whatsoever.

When I changed jobs, it was time to find a new host. By this time, blogger had evolved into what we know today and I no longer felt like maintaining code, so it made sense to move the whole enchilada here.

I have had some difficulty in the blogging arena recently. Not because I have run out of things to say, but because I have been too conscious of what I say and where. One of the drawbacks of gaining years, I suppose. Also one of the drawbacks of multiple platforms. Too many tools, not one of them a hammer.

The main purpose of this post was to try out yet another new tool, yet another android blogging app. Guess I got carried away, which means this tool feels comfortable in hand and may lead to future use.

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2012-05-19T18:44:00.000+02:00

A bit of autumn left.

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2012-05-18T18:43:00.000+02:00

Randomly found a copy of my mother’s book on a shelf in a bookshop. This is a rare thing indeed, as the book has never really been sold in bookshops. Can only hope this will change now, and we will see it more often.

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2012-05-17T18:41:00.000+02:00

Pretty cupcake.

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2012-05-16T18:34:00.000+02:00

Roses from work for Mothers Day

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2012-05-15T18:29:00.000+02:00

Taken in the Frauenkirche in Munich, 31 March 2012. I still love doorways.

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2012-05-14T18:28:00.000+02:00

Roadside fridge fun

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2012-05-13T18:26:00.000+02:00

Spoilt for Mothers Day. Hope you were too.

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2012-05-12T18:24:00.000+02:00

And this was breakfast. And it was glorious.

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2012-05-11T18:19:00.000+02:00

A nasturtium on my plate. Had a lovely mushroom ‘burger’ from Dukes – highly recommended to carnivores and herbivores alike.

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2012-05-10T18:17:00.000+02:00

Beautiful afternoon sky

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2012-05-09T18:11:00.000+02:00

My skull candies.

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2012-05-08T13:24:00.000+02:00

TG for Instagram

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2012-05-07T13:10:00.000+02:00

One of those WTF moments. A provocatively dressed cow reading a news paper in Sandton City.