Now here’s proof:

Thanks must go to The World’s Biggest Suck-up for sending me this.

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Today, after a very busy weekend of Scooter Giving and Ginger Party Madness, I picked up some gorgeous cupcakes from Angel and proceeded to my sister’s house where Jenty taught me how to do a newborn shoot.

If you haven’t heard of Jenty, where the hell have you been? She is Jozi twitter’s resident photog – and her shoots are a much desired commodity among geeks.

Things I learned today:

• No matter what you do, an upset baby will not sleep
• Baby shoots are hard work
• Photographers carry a lot of equipment
• Photography is not about fancy lenses, it’s about talent
• I am not as talented as Jenty

Enough babbling – have a look at the pics I have selected out of the over 400 taken, can you spot the difference between mine and hers?

[View with PicLens]

12►

You couldn’t? wow – you obviously need glasses To help you along, check out some of hers on her blog.

Thanks so much Jeannette – today was magical!

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1. Tatum Maria Duveen, the new love of my life

My brain was stuffed full of so many amazing things last week that my body is totally exhausted. If you want to read what happened on Friday, I’ve written 2 blog posts on it, here and here.

I will sum Friday up in a few bullet points:

• Seeing Clay Shirky talk in person was totally surreal, felt like I was in a TED video.
• Actually meeting Dustin Diaz from Twitter made me have an even bigger fangirl moment. I have a serious geek crush on that man’s brain and abilities. (mostly I’m jealous he works at Twitter)
• Knowing that these international big cheeses cared enough to come to our little country gave me such hope for the future.
• Laughing on the grass at lunchtime with Sam, ExMi, Byron, Mel, Elan, Justin, Eve, Kate, Brett and Reuben made me smile, look up at the sky and realise that despite everything, I am blessed, very, very blessed.

Craig, & the rest of the Emerging Media team: Thank so much for getting me there – Tech4Africa was truly inspirational!

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1. Tech4Africa: The ‘World Cup’ of Geekdom (part 1)
2. The world’s best girlfriend (me)

With international speakers like Clay Shirky, Leila Chirayath Janah and Dustin Diaz, supported by local minds like Alistair Fairweather, my very own ginger boss Rob Stokes and Barbara Mallinson (and too many more to mention, see here for the full list), the conference promised to be, well, rad… and if the first day is anything to go by, it will exceed my rather large expectations.

The proceedings were kicked off by Internet Solutions CEO; Derek Wilcocks. He spoke about cloud computing and the impact that the internet is having on our society today, describing the internet as The Fifth Estate. According to Wilcocks, the internet is a ‘power block in society, a force that can determine our society and communications’. He spoke of global corporations who are using the internet and social media to open communication channels, perform market research, develop brand advocates and increase customer service efficiency, but cautioned us that as powerful as the internet is, employees with the most cohesive face to face networks are up to 23% more productive than their digitally networked counterparts. For more, read my post on the Tech4Africa Blog.

There were two distinct highlights of day one for me. The first was definitely the Q&A session with Andy Budd and ‘The Knights of the Social Media Round Table’; Dustin Diaz from Twitter, Joe Stump (formerly from Digg), John Resig from Mozilla and Jonathan Snook from Yahoo! (yes, this is a geek’s wet dream). These guys are funny and have a great rapport, making some heavy tech-laden content engaging even to non-techies like me. I actually had a moment where I had to stop myself from rushing the stage, laying prostrate at Dustin’s feet and thanking him for changing my life with Twitter, my favourite thing in the world. (sssh, don’t tell my ginger, my niece or Quirk)

The other session that touched me was Leila Chirayath Janah’s Keynote on creating work in Africa. Leila is a woman that every one of us should aspire to be like. She gave up a life in America to come to Africa to teach.

Out of this she founded Samasource, which allows people living in poverty to cross the digital divide. Leila surprised the audience with some astounding stats on education and literacy levels in Africa, which are higher than we all think. The real problem is lack of work, unemployment drives young people to join terrorist organisations in droves because it is the only way to earn money to feed their families.

Local trade and crafts does not make an impact on the poor either. Products made by poor people are often only bought by locals or a few tourists, making an average maximum of $1 a day for the sellers.

Conversely, most corporations do not make products that are affordable for the majority of the 3rd world citizens. In Leila’s words, ‘we must engage the bottom of the pyramid if we are to eradicate poverty‘.

Samasource’s mission is to connect poor people to work via the internet, it builds tools to allow their customers to work with them without outsourcing to a large company. It’s amazing, inspiring and I actually had a lump in my throat at the end. Read more on my post on the Tech4Africa blog.

I am simply loving this conference so far, the networking alone has made it worth it. I have met amazing people ‘IRL’ that got me through the abyss of last week through all their tweets, Facebook messages etc. This is why I’m a geek, this inspiring, mind-blowing ‘connectedness’, both online and offline.

Here’s to another rocking day tomorrow!

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1. Tech4Africa, The World Cup of Geekdom (part 2)
2. The world’s best girlfriend (me)
3. Lesson #2: Don’t blog while sick

Never a dull moment, sometimes you made me want to pull my hair out in frustration, sometimes you made me want to put my arms around you and squeeze tight to thank you for giving me everything. You were loud, a toothy smile, a lipstick mark kiss, a full laugh and those ridiculous coral nails.

You epitomised the cliche ‘Live life to the fullest’. In fact, you put that damn phrase to shame. You squeezed every last drop out of life, then you rolled up the tube and squeezed out some more. Every single person that met you was touched by your ‘Anita Magic’, an intangible feeling that makes them think about you in the oddest moments. You taught us that the greatest gift was giving. That in giving of ourselves and in helping other people, we would make the biggest difference in the world.

You were my mother. In this post, I remember you.

Remember when I stole Romy’s birth ring and wore it to nursery school? It got stuck on my finger and cut off my blood flow, the teacher had to take me to the doctor to get it cut off before I lost my finger. You arrived at the doctor in a flurry of blonde hair, shouting “Where’s my child?”. I was so relieved when I saw you, and utterly shocked when you gave me a hiding right there in the doctor’s rooms, followed by a huge hug.

Remember when I was 5 and had to make something for the Easter parade at school? I forgot to tell you – you sent me to bed and you stayed up all night making me an Easter bonnet that looked like a famous designer had made it. I walked into school the next day and was the envy of everyone.

Remember when Romy and I did athletics and you would stand at the finish line to catch us in a hug as soon as we crossed it? It didn’t matter where we came in the race because we new you would always be there. But somehow knowing that you would made us push harder, run faster and (in Romy’s case, at least) win the race.

Remember when it was our birthday? Every year you put up balloons and banners and presents outside our bedroom doors while we slept, and when we woke – you said it was ‘the birthday fairy’. Amazing how the birthday fairy had your handwriting. You did this until my 14th birthday, it never got old.

Remember when you used to fetch us from school in your ‘gangster car’? The white ’shark’ with the tinted windows, low profile tyres, mags & dropped suspension. You would get out of the car in your heels with your impossibly long legs and give us that smile. The boys would always wait with us, just to get a glimpse of you.

Remember when we wanted the latest shoes/jeans/CD player/anything? You would sacrifice everything you had to get it. In fact, I cant once remember you going shopping for yourself. I bet when I clean out your cupboard, I’ll find the same clothes you had 20 years ago.

Remember when your heart broke? And we held you like you were a baby and we wept with you. And you were unashamed to feel, to rant and to rage and to sob – because you taught us that emotions are not something to be quashed, that you can’t live your life worrying about what is socially acceptable.

Remember when we had parties at the house? Everyone was welcome, the more the merrier. You were one of us, you drank with us, danced with us and made sure we were fed. It embarrassed the hell out of me but secretly I was glad my friends were all so jealous of my ‘cool mom’.

Remember when Shaun was late coming home and his phone battery had died? When I woke up at 2am in a panic and raced over to your house, banged on the door and woke the neighbours. You held me while I cried, worried that something had happened to him… it was raining so hard and you held me tight. You told me to go home, if he wasn’t home by sunrise to call you. He got home 10 minutes later.

Remember when you SMSed me every time anyone in our family had a birthday? Just to remind me to wish them, cos you knew I’m bad at remembering things like that. Remember how you bought other people presents and said they were from me? You knew I would run out of time.

Remember when you became a granny? How you prepared like crazy in the months leading up to Tatum’s birth. How you got a cot and you phoned me 4 frikken times a day to discuss how you were going to decorate her room at your house. How you worried so much about Romy but you didn’t want to worry her so you called me. Remember how you felt when you held her for the first time, how you laughed and you cried at the same time. How you felt that your life was full, how proud you were.

I remember all of it and more. Right now my heart is hurting and I can’t see the light, right now I want to scream at the sky ‘WHY!?’, to go and ask that stupid truck driver why he didn’t just put his hazards on, to scream at the municipality for switching the lights off on the highway to save electricity, who gives a shit about electricity when lives are being lost?!?!.

But I know you would say “It will be alright Bugsy, it will be OK my baby”. I know you would want us to celebrate your life, To have a big, over the top party in your honour, with feathers and fairies and diamantes. Because you said it on Sunday: “I may not have class but I have lots of love”.

You did Mamma, you had more love than anyone on earth, every time someone needed you, you just made your heart bigger to accommodate them. You need to know how proud we are of you, how proud I am to call you my mom. And now that you are gone, we will make our hearts bigger to finish what you started, to make the world a better place one hug at a time.

CrazyBeautiful.

Anita.

16 May 1956 – 2 August 2010.

Forever in our hearts.

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We’ve been together for close on 6 years but I still cannot talk about anything with anyone for more than 5 minutes without mentioning him at least a squillion times.

Case in point: Today we did a Christmas Party Interview (it’s an interview we do at Quirk, once the powers are be are happy with a candidate the team interviews them for the sole purpose of determining if they will ‘fit in’, i.e. are they an employee or a QuirkStar?)

Sooooo… where was I? Oh yes, anywaaay… We were doing a Christmas party interview with this dude and after it was done I realised I had managed to work my Ginger Boyfriend of awesomeness, Shaun Custers, into the conversation no less than 4 times… in an INTERVIEW!

I don’t know whether to be concerned or really frikken happy. I mean, after almost 6 years this level of happiness is almost unheard of right?

Either way, I love you babe.

Why?

Just because.

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Today the world changed for me. I met my niece for the first time.

Predictably, this story started 9 months ago. In actual fact, for me it started on 13 January – my baby sister (okay okay, 23 is not exactly a baby, but she’ll always be my baby sister) walked into my birthday party at Molly Malone’s in Fourways looking like a million dollars. She was wearing a long black dress and her naturally platinum blonde hair was curled to perfection. It was a good thing she looked so hot, because it distracted me from screeching ‘WHAAAT?!?’ when she casually leaned over the table and whispered ‘Don’t freak out… but… I’m pregnant’.

So the existence of Tatum was known. Nothing would ever be the same. It took me a while to wrap my head around it, I’m not going to lie. It took even longer to actually sink in. My baby sister was going to have a baby. Wow.

To cut a long story short – the most beautiful, perfect, cherubic angel took her first breath at 08h10 this morning. I hid it well but when I laid eyes on her sleeping face for the first time, I fell in love. No, I don’t want one of my own just yet – don’t get ahead of yourself. This one is enough for me for now.

To my phenomenally brave and talented baby sister: Munchkin, I am so unbelievably proud of you. You are going to be an awesome mom.

To Tae, I can’t wait to take you for ice-creams, to take too many photos of you and to be the one who you come to when your mom “just doesn’t get you”. I promise to be the best auntie that ever lived.

Ok, so I know I’m biased but how GORGEOUS is this little girl!?!?!

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1. Tatum’s newborn shoot

Then last week I got an email from the incomparable Mongezi Mtati, he wanted to know if I’d like to go to a game as a guest of the International Marketing Council of South Africa. Holy Crapnuts, would I?!?! He then proceeded to make sure I owed him for life by announcing that we were not just going to any game and we did not just have any tickets, we were going to watch Africa’s last hope, The Black Stars from Ghana take on the *insert expletive here* from Uruguay at Soccer city…. and we had BOX TICKETS!!

The game was everything I could possibly have imagined and so much more. From the VIP parking right next to the stadium (we drove through no less than 8 security checkpoints and they waved us through every time like we were frikken dignitaries) to the gourmet food, wine and complimentary blankets in the suite, the stadium staff and our hosts (we’ll call them the IMC from now on shall we? that other name is a bit long) made sure we had the best experience possible.

And even though Ghana didn’t win I had the night of my life. The buzz of 84 000 vuvuzela’s is a sound that I will never ever forget. They only fell silent when that *insert even worse expletive here* Suarez kicked Uruguay into the semi-finals. They stayed silent when the Ghanian hero Asamoah Gyan fell to his knees and couldn’t get up, but they rang out once more, accompanied by the clapping, cheering and chanting of the crowd as we gave the Black Stars our appreciation, love and support the best way we know how, by drowning out the South American cheats’ celebrations.

As I stood there with tears streaming down my face I was prouder to be South African than I’ve ever been in my life.

Proud, and so very grateful to be able to say “I was there”

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1. You’ll save money

Veggie food is much cheaper than meat, I saved an average of R50 a day!

2. You’ll try new things

I don’t normally cook with lentils, mung bean sprouts, chickpeas, red kidney beans etc but when you’re a vegetarian you have to eat all that so you don’t drive yourself mad with potatoes and broccoli every night. I’m glad to report they are totally awesome and even the ginger enjoyed them (except the lentil ragu, he fed that to the cat)

3. You’ll gain weight

Well, not necessarily, but vegetarian dinners aren’t all rabbit food. If you’re not careful you’ll eat a lot more rice, pasta, cream & bread than you are used to… especially in winter where you will eat almost everything as long as it’s warm and has salt on it.

4. You’ll soon run out of things to cook

I tried to be inventive but I was pretty much at the limits of my imagination by Saturday night. I know there are seasoned veggie-monsters out there who can find something new to whip up every night but I am so used to starting my meal plan with a dead animal that I struggled at the end.

I am, however, proud of what I conjured up. Here it is, in order:

Sunday

- Aubergine lasagne with basil pesto

Monday

- Thai green curry with chickpeas and mung bean sprouts

Tuesday

- Butternut, feta and pumpkin seed penne in a white wine sauce

Wednesday

- Vegetable Briyani… and… tomato & lentil ragu with Haloumi cheese

Thursday

- Red Kidney bean tortillas with creamed corn

Friday

- Tomato noodle soup at the ginger’s mom’s house

Saturday

- Hawaiian veggie burgers & fries

So we survived the week intact and actually enjoyed it. So much so that we are going to observe Vegetarian Mondays from now on.

That said, dinner tonight was a big hunk of rare beef. And it was gooooooood!

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So I guess you want to hear the story – and we all know I love telling them!
After the Kulula debacle in February, Shaun & I were given Kulula vouchers, which expire at the end of May. We briefly discussed options for redeeming them but the time/finances were never right. So about a month ago I asked my fearless leaders if I could fly down to Cape Town for the May Quirk board meeting (one QuirkStar is allowed to attend this a month – very cool huh?). Then I started saving and scheming and negotiating – as only I can. Kulula helped a lot here – they went a long way toward making up for February.

Long story short – I had a weekend in Cape Town for me and The Ginger all sorted. But he had no idea. So the scheming continued… I started moaning that my brakes on my car were grating about 2 weeks ago and told Shaun that I was going to take my car in when I went to Cape Town… would he fetch me from the airport?

I proceeded to be as irritating as possible, from whining about having to go to Cape Town, to rubbing it in that I was going – I needed him to resent the fact that he wasn’t coming with. He was infuriatingly gracious as usual but I think it worked.

On Tuesday night I packed some of his clothes in a bag (the ones I knew he wouldn’t miss) and then ‘dropped my car off at Toyota to get the brakes done’ -my car was at Mary’s house. I came to Cape Town for the board meeting (which was excellent by the way – so worth it) and spent the rest of the week working from our beautiful Cape Town office. Ask the queen of overshare; @Exmi how gorgeous it is – she got a skype tour.

On Friday evening he arrived to fetch me from the airport; I told him to park his car, go inside and get his boarding pass, to which he replied: “ I don’t understand”. When he eventually figured out what was going on, he got on the plane and our weekend began.

Thanks to Neal & Graham for hosting us at The Toad in Noordhoek for the Rugby (what a gorgeous pub!) – and to Rob for a yummy breakfast and a great wine farm recommendation. We spent this weekend being proper tourists, from scenic drives through Chapmans Peak, to wine tasting in Franschhoek & Stellenbosch and walks on the Sea Point promenade.

What can I say – I am the world’s best girlfriend….

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2. Kulula sucks!
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