The iPod game

I know I've already posted for today but I thought that I should do this. It's the famous iPod Game! Helen did it and then I read on Travis's blog (Don't ask me why the 'bl' of blog are included in the link and not the rest...?) that he did it to so I figured that I ought to do it myself. This is how it works...

1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool...


01. Opening Credits: “The Zephyr Song” by The Red Hot Chilli Peppers". Not much relevence there, methinks.

02. Waking Up: “Emmulation” by me. I wrote this song a very long time ago and it's not very good. It's not on target AT all! Unless I was waking up in a fowel mood and in a huge rush.

03. First Day at School: “Saltwater” by Chicane. Not exactly first day music but I can go with that.

04. Falling in Love: “Offshore (Original Mix)” by Chicane. Not bad actually!

05. Fight Song: “Sand, Sea and Sun” by me. Another track I wrote. Most definitely off! Unless the whole fight scene was actually a paridy and also in slow motion. Ha! Ha! Ha!

06. Breaking Up: “Never Be The Same Again” by Melanie C. Most male's I know would be embarassed to say that they like this song but I do. I think it could work.

07. Prom: “Red Skies” by Chicane. Not really what I had in mind but if it was a really hectic dance then I guess it could work...sortof...

08. Life's Okay: “The Patriot Theme” from the movie 'The Patriot' – DEFINITELY not right! Unless I was an evil bad guy and my master plan was soming to a dramatic climax.

09. Mental Breakdown: “Buttercup” by Freshly Ground. It actually works really well!

10. Driving: I don't know what it's called but it's by Carine Baily Ray, I think. It works rather well. When I find out what the track is called I'll post it. It really works though.

11. Flashback: “Ganster Trippin” by Fatboy Slim. I guess a flashback to before I was born wouldn't really seem odd given my life...

12. Getting Back Together: “I feel it” by me. Totally doesn't work!

13. Wedding: “Samba de Janeiro” by Bellini. If it was the reception maybe...

14. Birth of a Child: “Homebase” by dZihan and Kamien. WOW!! Definitely works!

15. Death Scene: Part of the 'Halflight' soundtrack. Maybe if it was leading up to my death?

16. Funeral Song: “Godspeed” by BT. Not at all funeral music! Never play this at a funeral unless you are trying to severe all ties to the family!

17. End Credits: “Break & Enter” by The Prodigy. I'm okay with that.

I really think I have far too much dance music for this to work for me! Perhaps I should retry it but minus all the dance tracks...

Oh! The humiliation!

How embarassing! My readers now know what a scatter-brain I am! Helen and Angela both pointed out that the last Random Fact For The Day: was a previously used fact! So today I will post two facts to make up for it as well as my sincere appologies to the universe in general. Sorry!

And in other news, tomorrow I am going to be an extra for a TV show! Yay! If you are lost, extras are the people that fill all the space in the background, doing things like trying to buy fruit or chatting on the phone, while the main characters of the TV show do all the important stuff such as kill people or make out with someone that they barely know in public. It's gonna be a blast! I'll let you all know how it goes.

Today was a work-filled day. I went in to the zoo and did my observations early for a change. It's actually rather disturbing because I'm getting up early and working hard which all goes very much against my inner stuff. I'm not usually like this...(ask Helen!)

Well, it's that time again...Time for...

Random Fact(s) For The Day:

During the chariot scene in 'Ben Hur' a small red car can be seen in the distance

Einstein couldn't speak fluently when he was nine. His parents thought he might be retarded

I knew that second one somehow...how disappointing...

Crap! I forgot to do my...

Random Fact For The Day:

Every person has a unique tongue print

Tah-dah!

My project volunteers

Hi all!





I'm severely overdue, as usual, with this post. It's been a bit of a hectic few days so I havn't really felt all that much like attending to my blog.





First things first. Athena, as promised, here is a picture of a lemur. This one is a black and white ruffed lemur (Varecia variegata variegata). This is the kind that I got to play with at the zoo, only mine was much smaller and had a tendency to look rather terrified at the sheer size of everything around him. The pic comes from http://www.trekearth.com/.

So, this weekend was the first of the sessions at the zoo with my volunteers. For those who are as lost as a russian in a swahili tribe, my masters project requires that I use volunteers to collect some of my data. It went incredibly well and Iwas left feeling a little spare becuase the volunteers, all high school students, caught on really quickly and were all finished up in no time at all! But I suppose that it's better that way than to have a group of morons who can't understand that they must write their name down and have a photo taken.

Saturday was also my sisters birthday! They are now 19yrs old. I somehow never thought that they would ever get to that age. They have always been my little sisters so to imagine them as old as I was at one stage seems rather odd. I know this is all very silly but that is how my mind works. They were ver uncooperative and said that we mustn't get them birthday presents. I refused to not get them something so I am going to take them to the movies some time.

They went off to a gig on Saturday evening and so I went to a pizza evening at my cousins house. It was really fun. David, Duncan and I filmed this ridiculously silly action movie over the course of the evening which was really fun! It is so funny! Probably only to us...but I enjoyed it so I don't really care.

Sunday saw a family lunch for my sisters birthday. We also had my sisters friend over. It was really nice and at the end of the day my sisters and I went off to the movies with some family friends. I must admit that it was a little awkward as I havn't really kept in touch with them for ages but it was nice.

We went to see 'The Fountain' which was beautiful. It did get rather annoying at times, such as the 5min shots of a bald Hugh Jackman floating through space in a bubble on his way to a large celestial dust cloud. Those bits were a little too '2001: A Space Odessy' for my tastes.

Then yesterday was my sisters curriculum planning at Wits. So I took her in and showed her where she was supposed to be and all. I also went and did some work in my lab and went to the zoo.

And today was brilliant because my supervisor said that he thought that one of my ideas for my project was brilliant! It's a really good feeling when one's supervisor or boss applaudes you. I know this sounds very lapdog-ish but as I said before, I don't care.

And tonight it's off to dinner with Sarah and Tom (possibly others). Lookin forward to it!

The internet is a wonderful thing

Howdy folks!

Just the other evening, I was browsing the web for information on exotic fruit. I have always wanted to taste all the amazing exotic fruit that abounds on our little blue orb. It all started when I tried star fruit for the first time. They are these amazing fruits that form these five kind of fins that are all joined and so when you cut them in half, it makes a star shape! They are really cool and taste amazing! Their flavour is very delicate and is almost like a granadilla but not. I really like them but many people say that they are insipid in flavour, but not I!

Anyway, the point of this little ramble is that somehow whilst floating my way through the cyber ocean, I happened to bump into a really old game that I used to play when I was younger. It is none other than 'Jazz Jackrabbit 2'. I say old because it came out in 1997. I was twelve then...

I ended up downloading the demo and trying it out once again. It was awesome! It's such a cute game and it really fun to play, not to mention that it was great to relive that chunk of childhood. And now, I am left with a problem. I want more. I have really been enjoying it and, to quote Faithless in their song entitled 'I want more', I want more!

I have searched the internut and there is nothing there...:(

And in other news, I am sure that I'm supposed to be going in to University now but I'm not really sure what I'd do if I went there. It's a little worrying because I'm scared that I'm not working when I should be and that my supervisor is going to crap on me for it. But at the same time, I have nothing to do and I'm at the zoo everyday so...

Random Fact For The Day:

Every person has a unique tongue print

Josh! He's SO cute! - Part II

Well guys, today I finally got to meet Josh the chimp for real. It wasn't technically the first time because as many of you avid blog readers will remember, I originally saw him a few months ago. And he was adorable then and nothing has changed! Here is a photo of the little ruffian that I took today:

This was one of the photos that I took on my cell phone. I managed to download them thanks to my sisters friend, Zelé. And thus, I am able to post you guys the photo of me lemur experience too! Yay!

Josh, because of the fact that he is still rather young and also hasn't been exposed to many people, is incredibly timid with people. He will only just let you touch him and only if he is being held at the time by Althea, his surrogate parent and friend of mine. He is SO cute though! Today he had a moment of boldness and gave my chest a poke. He obviously thought that it looked like it needed a good poking and I was more than happy to oblige!

My sister was with me at the time too as I had taken her through to our old high school to drop off some books and to collect her portfolio. It was a little odd because when I was there I saw my old, and all-time favourite teacher, Ms. Barnsley. Tom knows her through family connections. It was odd because I havn't seen her in about 5 years, so just the general awkwardness as would be expected. It was rather funny because she asked me if I still kept in contact with Duncan, who is my cousin and thus I thought it was a bit of a silly question.

Anyhoo, Gemma was with me and she too was permited the honour of touching Josh. She made little cooing noises and chatted about him all the way home. It was rather funny. Understandable though, he is just about the cutest thing I've ever seen!

Random Fact Of The Day:

40% of McDonald's profits come from the sales of Happy Meals

Birthdays all over!

Well hello there children!





So, today's my dad's birthday. We, being my sisters, my mom and me, all felt terrible because we didn't get him anything for his birthday. But, in our defence, he didn't actually want any gifts! I find this hard to believe but that is actually what he said! He refused to have us buy him gifts. Odd man. We kinda cheated though and went and got him a kinder egg. He was pleased. My sisters made him a big blue and orange cake which they then decorated with yellow and purple icing. My family love making cakes in all these very loud colours and complimentary combinations. I think it's quite cool! Here is a photo of the cake:

I went out this afternoon in search of candles for the cake because we soon realised that we had nothing! NOTHING AT ALL! So I went and found a crazy store that had some candles and got him a singing candle! It was really funny because as the candle played 'Happy Birthday' the tune became increasingly slow and out of key because the battery was wearing out. Needless to say, my father was most impressed.

The next one on the list is my new-found friend, and fellow vegetarian blogger (Yay! We veggie-bloggers are way cool!), Athena. Her actual birthday is on Sunday if I'm not mistaken but she is having a birthday party at her house on Saturday. Only problem is...I have no clue when or where it is and what is required for this party! Let me just find out quickly...

Tom says that it's at her house at 19:00.

Then, next would be my sisters next week. I have no idea what I'll get them at all! I never know with those two. And they hunt in pairs so it's harder to get gifts because you inevitably get gifts that are somehow unequal in their 'coolness'. Curse the fact that they are twins! Why couldn't they just be courteous and be born a year apart or something!

And now for the part you've all been waiting for...

Random Fact For The Day:

In Lebanon it is legal to have sex with a female animal, but illegal with a male one

That was a little disturbing...!

It's true! We are becoming dumber!

Well guys, the last three days have confirmed for me the terrible truth. The world is becoming dumber and dumber. I have had my suspitions for quite some time now but the horrible truth has reared its ugly bottom to moon the intelegent members of the species.



I was reading an article in the newspaper about a german motorist who managed to crash his car because his GPS navigation system told him to! Seriously! Apparently, his nav system told him to turn left and instead of actually using that large thing that holds his eyes in place, he obeyed the commands of the machine. As it turned out, he was turning left onto the pavement on the opposite side of the road and by the sounds of things, didn't think it at all odd when his car ramped the pavement. I say this because he didn't stop there. He continued to drive until his car wheels got stuck in the tram lines on the far side of the pavement. In the process of crashing his car and having to have it all cleaned up, which took a good few hours, he also managed to delay countless trams! All because he listened to a machine instead of...God forbid...THINKING!!!



Then, I was chatting to my dad the other night about how school has changed from when he was small to now and he mentioned that they didn't have calculators back then. I really don't know how they coped. I'm sure you all understand what I'm saying here. I can do math with ease, just not in my head! I can't actually think that hard! It's scary!



Then, this evening I was watching something on the National Geographic Channel about apes and it reminded me of a recent thing in the news about a potential new species of great ape found in the DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo). I then went online to research it a little and came across this comment which I find rather disturbing:



"We cannot rule out the possibility that it is a new species of ape, or a new subspecies or some form of hybrid," said Duane Rumbaugh, a professor at Georgia State University.

The problem here lies in the fact that the individual who said this stuff was a professor. A PROFESSOR! What kind of academic specialising in the biological sciences doesn't understand some of the most basic concepts with regard to species, sex and genetics! For all non-biologists out there, there is no way of hybridising two species unless they are very closely related and generally this doesn't lead to viable offspring, or at least offspring that are able to continue their lineage.

Now, pray, do explain how someone like that manages to become a professor? Could it be that in the world of stupid people the anecdotal phrase 'takes one to know one' really comes into play with job selection? Could an idiot have given the job position of professor to another of their kind in order to further the stupid interests of the moron agenda...?

And my final, and probably most convincing piece of evidence is still out there in the world. All you need do in order to experience the reality that idiots are taking over is go for a drive. Seriously, has anybody else noticed the incredible surge in the amount of people who do stupid things on the road? Things like not indicating and then crossing four lanes on the highway while doing over 120km/h? Anyone...? Well it's out there and it's winning the fight against the human claim of intelegence.I'm doing my bit to fight imberciles with my 'Random fact of the day' insert. What are YOU doing? ;p

Random Fact Of The Day:

A giraffe can clean its ears with its 21-inch tongue!

And in other news...here is a photo of a beetle that I found in Kamieskroon. He was a very cute beetle and he posed so nicely for his photo. I hope he is still alive and running around in the hills of Namaqualand...

I think he needs a name. All you internutters, please suggest good names for my beetle. You can post your suggestions as comments!

What is love?

Hi all!

I tried to blog yesterday but for some reason the blogger site was down or something and it wouldn't let me. Can you ever forgive me for leaving that little sliver of my life blank...?

Today when I returned from going to a meeting with my supervisor (for which, he was late for a change!), and then going to the zoo, my dad gave me an article to read from the newspaper. It was the 'Stoep talk', a daily comment section that is almost always hysterically funny. This particular one was about the responces of a group of children aged 4 to 8 yrs old to the question, 'What is love?' These were some of my favourite responces.

"When somebody loves you, the way that they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth" - Billy (4)

"Love is when a girls puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other" - Karl (5)

"Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your french fries without making them give you any of theirs" - Chrissy (6)

"If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend you hate" - Nikka (6)

"I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones" - Lauren (4)

"You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget" - Jessica (8)

And my favourite: "Love is what's in the room at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen" - Bobby (7)

Well, I hope you feel that your life has more meaning now. I have yet to read the rest of the paper.

Random Fact Of The Day:

George Washington grew marijuana in his garden

Hmmm...a true heart stopper.

Todays photo is of a little girl, named Gemma, who came over to myself and a group of friends while we were building a sand castle on the beach. We didn't know her from a bar of soap but she decided that we looked like we needed her guidance. In this photo she is seated at the throne that was originally intended to be a castle. Her dad is standing off to the side while a friend of mine, Alice stands in the background. I sometimes wonder what happened to Gemma...

I refuse to pay!

Hi gang!

Sorry about yesterdays rather depressing post. It's something that has been on my mind for a very long time now and I had to get it out of my system.

Today's tale is a considerably more humourous and light-hearted one than that of yesterday. It occurred this very afternoon when I went shopping with my mother. We were at a 'Pick-n-Pay', one of South Africa's largest supermarket chains. As it just so happens, apart from stocking all kinds of vegetarian foods, Pick-n-Pay's have another thing in their favour: they sell airtime for less than it is worth!

At Pick-n-Pay's airtime, or cell phone credit for those who haven't the faintest idea what I'm on about, is cheaper than it should be. Most other places charge the exact amount for their airtime, but not good old dependible Pick-n-Pay! No sir!

So anyway, today I went shopping with my mother and we were at the checkout counter and the kind checkout clerk had run up all our items when my mother remembered that she had to buy some airtime. So she asked the clerk for one of the R29,00 vouchers. The clerk replied saying that it would be another R28,00.

My mother looked annoyed. 'No, I want the twenty nine rand voucher, please.'

The clerk looked confused, but patiently responded, 'Yes, that will be twenty eight rand.'

My mother continued, 'No, you don't understand. I want the twenty nine rand voucher, not the twenty eight rand one!'

The very patient clerk looked at my mother and explained, 'No, the twenty nine rand voucher is only twenty eight rand. You save one rand!'

My mother didn't buy into it at all...

This conversation continued for some time before my sister intervened and explained to my mother that at a Pick-n-Pay, the airtime was cheaper. Upon this realisation, my mother beamed and, after paying, walked over to me and proudly declared, 'Guess what? Airtime is cheaper here!'

It was hysterical!

Random heart-stopping Fact Of The Day

A male emperor moth can smell a female emperor moth up to 7 miles away

This terrifying image is what greeted me every Valentines day. It's a good friend of mine, David. Every Valentines day he dresses up as cupid (with a motorbike helmet) and delivers gifts to all his friends. It's a nice jesture but he hasn't done it for some time now. He is a little odd...

Special people

Hello all!

I have just finished reading Tom's little piece on relationships. It is rather an amazing coincidence, but I was going to blog on something similar! I wanted to blog about some of the special people in my life who I love.

It all started this morning with the traditional, after-church tea with gran. We arrived at her place and she had somehow managed to whip together the tea and some cake and stuff by the time we arrived which is unusual because we were not late at all. So either her vitamin supplements suddenly kicked in and she shot around her home doing everything at a ridiculous pace or somehow she bent time so that she could have more time to do things in than was actually passing...

Anyhoo, while there she produced some photographs that she had dug up. My whole family passed the photos around and as per usual, I was the very last to get to look at them (perhaps I shall rant about that at a later stage...). It was good though because it gave me more time to enjoy the delicious date (not of the romantic kind) cake that she served us with our tea.

Eventually, the photos came my way and they were of my mother and my aunt feeding my sisters with bottles at my great-aunt's old house when we were all very tiny people. One of the photos in the pile was this one here:

It is a photo of three cousins. From right to left, Me, Sarah and Duncan. I really have no idea how old I was in this photo but it just made me think about my relationship with these two nutters. The three of us have always been very good friends and have gotten into countless troubles together. We just gel so well and it makes me sad to think that I don't get to see them as much as I would like to anymore.

Some history: Sarah is four years older than Duncan and I, who are only about two weeks apart. I'm the older of us. Sarah and the two of us went through a not-so-close stage when she was a teen, but since then have all been close. Then, in the early years of Varsity, Duncan and I had a huge fight which lasted, I am ashamed to say, almost a year and a bit. We didn't talk at all and I think to a degree he still holds certain things against me. And with good reason, I suppose. And this makes me angry.

I can't believe that I would let myself get into a situation where this kind of thing would happen! And how could I have turned my back on both a friend and relative?! I say relative because he is more than a cousin to me. They both are. When my family was up in Italy and I was down here, essentially living alone, they kind of adopted me. I would go visit them on weekends and they would take me with them on holiday and everything. But now, after our fight, Duncan and I are never going to be the same, and it makes me very sad.

If you ever read this, Duncan, I just want to say that I'm very sorry and that if I could go back and stop all this from happening, I would...

And to the rest of you guys, if I EVER even look like I'm heading into the same sort of scenario with anyone, slap me silly and make me realise what I'm doing! I love you guys all so much and I don't think I could ever forgive myself if I hurt you all like I've hurt Duncan. You all is ROX!

Random Fact For The Day:

A person cannot taste food unless it is mixed with saliva. For example, if strong-tasting substance like salt is placed on a dry tongue, the taste buds will not be able to taste it. As soon as a drop of saliva is added and the salt is dissolved, however, a definite taste sensation results. This is true for all foods. Try it!

Today's zoo tale

Well gang, I have achieved one of my lifelong ambitions today! A few years ago I did a project with Laura and some others on Madagascar and Lemurs. From that point onward, I have always been obsessed with lemurs. This was long before the movie 'Madagascar' came out and when it did, Helen and I sat through it discussing which species each lemur was - very sad I know, but they are SO cute!

So anyhoo, as part of my lemur fetish, I swore to myself that someday I would work on lemurs so that I could somehow hold one. Well, now I don't need to work on them!

I was walking around the zoo talking to my friend Althea, who works there as curator of the primates and reptiles. We were discussing how much work she had to do, which by the way is ridiculous! I was supposed to go with her to meet the famous Josh (http://thelifeofa20something.blogspot.com/2006/10/joshhes-so-cute.html). Anyway, we were walking and chatting and she mentioned offhand that we first had to go and give some medication to a lemur. I, naturally, was thrilled at the prospect of getting that close to a lemur and went along very willingly.

We entered the animal hospital at the zoo and Althea had a long chat with the resident vet while preparing a small dish of mashed fruit and milk formula. She then turned to me and explained that I was going to feed the baby lemur! I was over the moon!

She then went into the cage to collect the baby lemur and to administer the mother's medication. The little one was passed over to me instantly and I went off to feed him! It was so amazing! He was tiny and he was so soft! He also smelled so nice! In the same way that babies smell nice. He just kinda smelt small and cute, if that makes any sense at all.

Apparently his mother has developed some mammary infection, which means her milk secreting glands are not in a good way. As a result, she cannot produce any milk for her little baby and so he has to be fed by us humans. Normally a lemur of his age would not be weaned at all but apparently he prefers to eat fruit than to drink milk formula from a bottle.

So I got to feed the baby lemur. I had to keep putting the food right under his nose because he kept getting distracted by things and forgot that his food was there! It was so cute! However, he was very gittery! The slightest sound or sudden movement made him panic. I felt terrible when I had dipped my finger into his fruit to try and encourage him to lick it up and as I raised my hand to his face he got such a fright that he crapped himself!

He was SO cute and if I could, I would most definitely have one as a pet! I took a photo of him with my phone but alas, I have yet to figure out how to transfer photos from my phone to my laptop. When I do, you'll get to see him.

Random Fact For The Day:

A raisin dropped in a glass of fresh champagne will bounce up and down continually from the bottom of the glass to the top

Oops...about your iguana...

Due to the fact that my supervisor will be, or should be, and possibly is, back from his holiday around now, I have been spending much of my time at the zoo trying to gather data for my masters project. I say trying because one might not really expect recording what a chimpanzee is doing to be a difficult endevour, but it is. Especially when the animal in question is a female with a very young baby who is very nervous.

This is what happened today. I was watching the chimp, rather successfully, until she decided to move to another area of her enclosure. I then moved to another area in order to get a good view of the chimp and try to figure out what she was up to. Helen was with me at the time and we both ran off to try spot the old female. She had other plans and eventually I gave up and we just went walking around the zoo. It was at this stage that we ran into the exciting occurance of the day!

We were walking past an enclosure that once housed some monkeys and now houses iguanas. Or, after today, iguana...We arrived at the scene just as one of the keepers realised that one of the iguanas had just escaped from the enclosure and was sunning itself in one of the flowerbeds! The keeper naturally tried to catch it and the thing ran off.

In no time a large herd of people, keepers and members of the public had arrived and were all trying to figure out what was going on. The keepers ended up chasing the iguana into a large storm drain thingy and spent much of their time wandering up and down the drain pipe. Helen and I both tried to do some searching ourselves but to no avial. It was gone.

So now there is an iguana in the drain at the zoo.

Darn...this isn't nearly as exciting as I expected it to be...I'll have to try harder next time.

Random Fact For The Day

The dot over the letter 'i' is called a tittle.

Here is a photo of me trying to write out a diary of what I'd been doing on the molerat trip:

Ahem...there is a large bird in your bathroom...

Today I changed one of the lights in the garden. It was a job that was severely overdue and in a sudden fit of usefulness, I changed it. As I returned into the house, my father walked up to me and asked me if I had seen the bird. I gave him a blank look and explained that I had no idea what he was on about. He then explained to me that as I had walked out to change the light outside, a hadeda had wandered into my bathroom rather confidently. Apparently it had walked into the garage of our house, entered into the passage and had made its way into my bathroom.

My sister has a fear of birds (I don't get it at all but anyway) and she had been in my bedroom at the time, watching a DVD on my laptop. When my dad aparently told her about the hadeda, which was at that stage still in the bathroom, she had shreaked and locked herself in my room. Eventually my father managed to chase the thing out. I was rather upset that he hadn't managed to take a photo of the large ibis next to my loo so I could show you guys!

I guess this will have to do then. It's a photo that Helen took in Darling of some Hadeda's flying in a flock. And so you all know, hadeda's are very large birds. They are about 80cm long and weight about...well I don't know but I'm sure that it's a lot for a bird! Let's just say that if a house cat were to attack one from behind, the bird could easily take off and fly with the cat attached.


Random Fact For The Day:

Your stomach has to produce a new layer of mucus every two weeks, otherwise it will digest itself.

I love my phone!

I love my new cellphone! It's so pretty and awesome and amazing and I love it! And today, at church my sister told a friend, in my presence might I add, that, and I quote, my phone was 'too cool for me'! How rude! Anyhoo, I threw something at her later on, as is customary for health inter-sibling relations ;)

Well the last couple of days have been awesome! On Thursday I went off to the zoo to observe my chimps for the first time in AGES. It was more out of fear of what would happen to me if I got to Wits to see my supervisor having done nothing at all all holiday. I doubt that he would really do anything appart from give me a rather unimpressed look and tell me to get my ass in gear and do some work. But none the less, I thought that a little work would certainly not kill me so I went off. It was great to see them again, especially because I realised that I am learning how to tell them apart which is brilliant!

Then, Friday was Tomkin's birthday! I, following a somewhat confusing conversation over chinese food, was convinced that his birthday was actually on the 7th (today) but no, it was on the 5th. We all went off to Gold Reef City, which was such fun! I havn't been to Jozi's only decent theme park in ages and so it was interesting to get to see it all again! It was so full though! There were hundreds of people with children all over the place.

Then, yesterday...is actually quite a blur in my mind. I can't for the life of me remember what the hell I did during the day. I know that I swam a lot. Our pool is amazing right now! The temperature is perfect! Anyhoo, last night was Tom's party, which was also awesome! I had such a ball! I saw Laura again, who has been away for a while, so we both caught up on what we've been up to. It was so nice to see her again and to just chill. Ten points Tomkins!

Otherwise, there has been little that is worth writing about happening in my life (save for one thing that I shan't write about). Hope yawl are doing smashingly!

Random Fact of the Day!

A shark can detect one part of blood in 100 million parts of water.

A rat can last longer without water than a camel.

I'm doing two today because the first one was a little lame and somewhat well known.

Random facts

I was sifting through all the random crap that fills my harddrive and I discovered a text file that I had downloaded form who knows where that contains many random facts. I shall post one with each blog entry. Here is today's one:

A Saudi Arabian woman can get a divorce if her husband doesn't give her coffee.

Darn...what was I going to write about...?

I think that I am rather tired. This epiphane isn't from any kind of signal that my somewhat lazy brain is sending to the rest of me but is more due to the fact that literally seconds ago I had a topic for todays blog entry but it has totally evapourated from my skulls inner recesses...So, either I'm tired or my age is catching up to me...


This is a photo of the swallow that haunted the shed in which we worked. He was very cute!

Ten points to Helen for getting a laptop!

That reminds me. I must recount a story of Helen and birds and a frightfully carrot-up-the-arse-sounding english woman, who coincidentally does seem to have a carrot up her arse. Although, come to think of it, it's more like she has a very angry racoon up her arse...

The story begins at the begining of 2006, our honours year. Helen and I happened to both be tutoring for the same course. The course was run by a particular staff member who nobody else in our department, apart from our head of school seems to like much. She is the lady in question, mentioned above. So as not to incriminate anyone, I shall refer to her in this story as 'Caroline' (Ha ha!).

Anyway, one day, Helen and I had to go and speak to 'Caroline' about how one of the practicals was going to be run. Neither of us wanted to attend this practical as it was one of the more shitty ones and it involved trapsing around a very large park ooo-ing and aah-ing at random birds that happened to fly past at the time - something about learning how to identify birds or some nonsense. Herein lies the root of the story, for Helen is hopeless at identifying birds. And, as part of her argument against attending the practical, she mentioned this to 'Caroline'. Upon hearing this, 'Caroline' recoiled in horror and insisted that Helen actually new much more than she thought.

'Caroline' then went on to explain to Helen how easy birding was. At this point I feel it is important to mention that Helen and I had gone to see 'Caroline' during our lunch break and had intended to go and buy spinach and feta pies from the theatre after our little chat with 'Caroline'. we had intended for our meeting to last only a short while - 5 min at the most. However, 'Caroline' had other plans.

"You see, birds are not as difficult as you might think," she said in her hot-potato-in-the-mouth british accent that just makes you want to slap her silly! "You can easily tell them apart. I mean, you know what a duck is, don't you? A duck is a duck is a duck. And you certainly can't confuse something like a weaver for anything else now can you? A weaver is clearly a weaver. Ostriches are so distinctive that there is no way of confusing them! An ostrich is an ostrich is an ostrich! And what about chickens! You certainly know what those look like and I'm confident that you will be able to point one of those out. And pigeons! Pigeons are SO easy to spot! I mean a pigeon is a pigeon, it can't be anything else! And doves are so common that you must know what a dove is! And geese are all over! A goose is a goose is a goose! Nobody can confuse those! And you know what a sparrow is. They are so easy to tell apart from the other birds. And, I mean, there is no way of confusing a peacock with anything else, now is there? And very few people can claim to be unable to identify a penguin. They are so distinctive! And all those birds of prey. An eagle is so clearly an eagle that it can't be confused for, say, a duck! After all, a duck is a duck is a duck..."

And so the very one-sided conversation continued until there was practically not a single kind of bird that had been forgotten, as if she was worried that the birds forgotten might find her and beat her up for making them feel left out! Eventually, we both, Helen and I, resorted to agreeing with everything that she said in the hopes that we might eventually get to go and actually eat something. Finally, after about 25min of bird speech, we were released to go and feed.

In the end we did attend the practical. We ran away after about 10min...

New years! (I.E. 2007)

Well gang, another year has come and gone and the world is still turning. It has been one hell of a year! So much has happened and I, personally have had a rather hectic emotional time this year. Firstly, as most of you will know from all my bitching, it has been my honours year and thus has been the most exhausting and overworked year of my life! Then, this was the year that my grandfather died. It took a major toll on all the family. It was the year that my parents returned home to South Africa from Italy which was also quite an emotional rollercoaster. My sisters underwent major surgery and treatment to have their jaws fixed up which has certainly been an experience for all of us.

It was also the first time that I attended an 'H2O' party! It was awesome! H2o for those who are confused is a kind of day long rave thing that is held at a water park here in Joburg. They have them throughout the year but I went to my first one last night - the new years party! It was amazing! I'm actually exhausted as a result...so todays should be a short post.

Everyone else has done the whole new years resolutions thing but I will break the mould and NOT do this! Wow...I'm such a rebel. Seriously, I don't see the point. They are just a bunch of promises that you make to yourself that you secretly know that you won't keep anyway so why bother. And besides, New Years, as an event, is pretty meaningless anyway. It is simply the end of a technical year that way placed on an arbitrary day.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not necessarily anti-New Years! In fact, I am all for celebrating. I really think that we don't party enough and that we should use any excuse to all get plastered and dance the night away! I just don't think that people should put so much significance into it and make empty promises and what not.

Sorry, I'm tired and so I'm not feeling particularly enthusiastic about life in general. Also, after reading Sarah's post about Sadam, I'm a little peeved at the universe in general.

Ooo! I forgot to say that at H2O, Dave (Friend) and I saw two celebrities! We saw a presenter from SABC3, Graham Richards, and some chick from ISIDINGO whose name is unknown to me. Some drunk guy spilled his beer onto Graham Richards's shoes. It was so funny!

And I shall end today's post with a short story that Helen forgot to mention on one of her posts. It concerns the swallow that she mentioned. It lived in the shed that we worked in. He lived on the floor and my guess was that he had tried to fly a little early, had fallen out of the nest and had lived on the floor instead. His parents were always around and would come flying past your head when you walked in which, despite expecting it, never ceased to freak me out.

One day we were offloading some stuff from our vehicle into the shed and the little swallow was hopping along the floor. I stopped to watch him and as I watched, he hopped along toward the door. He stopped on the rim of the door frame and looked around for a bit. He seemed to be surveying the world, trying to figure out what was going on. Suddenly, rather unexpectedly as most sudden things are, he opened his wings and flew off! I had witnessed the first *successful* flight of a baby swallow! It was beautiful and I felt honoured to have been present for such a momentous occasion in the life of that tiny, somewhat ugly, creature.

To friend or not to friend...

Hey all!

Hope the final days of 2006 are treating you all splendidly! I certainly can't complain. Well, actually that isn't 100% true but we'll quickly skip along to the point of todays post.

To Friend or not to Friend, that is the question...

If someone likes you, are you under obligation to like them in return? I'm not talking in the teenage girl, 'so do you, like, like him?' kind of way but in terms of friends. I realise that this is a bit of a random topic to blog but you'll see that there was some kind of thought behind it.

It all stems from the situation that I live in. When my family and I moved off to Italy, my grandparents, who owned it, rented out our house to an Italian family that had just moved over to South Africa (I realise the irony in the situation). Now, this family lived in our house for about 5 yrs and then got a house in Edenvale. During their stay, our families became great friends. I became friends with the kids, one is my age and the other, four yrs younger than me.

My problem is that I really like the kids but the parents on the other hand...To make things worse, I really don't like the social circle that they are part of and so I came to this question. They like me and would do anything in the world to help me but I just don't like them. Is it wrong for me to feel this way? Should I simply love them by default? What is your take on the situation?

And after that I figured that I should brighten everyones day with the instructions written on a pair of chopsticks that I got in Italy on how to use chopsticks. I am typing it our word for word, nothing has been altered:

Welcome to Chinese Restaurant. Please try your Nice Chinese Food With Chopsticks the traditional and typical of Chinese glonous history and cultual. BAMBOO CHOPSTICKS PRODUCT OF CHINA

Tuk under tnurnb and held firmly. Learn how to use your chopsticks. Add second chcostick hold it as you hold a pencil. Hold tirst chopstick in original position move the second one up and down Now you can pick up anything:

PRODUCTOF CHINA

I have the chopsticks here infront of me so if any of you are doubtful of what I have written above, we can always organise for you to have a privat viewing of the specimen...;P

Siblings...

Hey Gang!

Today was crunch day for many a South African high school student as it was the day that the final end of year results for the last year of high school, called Matric, were released. My two sisters were amongst that large and rather unhappy group. They were so stressed out about their results that I doubt they slept very well last night. I certainly didn't, but that was for other reasons.

This morning, they came running into my room to wake me up and tell me that they both got 4 distinctions! They each scored over 80% (or is it over 85%?) for English first language, Italian second language and Art. Then, Gemma and Lucia, for those are their names, got the same marks for Geography and History respectively! The only subjects that they didn't do all that well in were Maths, Science and Biology.

Now, how am I, the elder of the three of us supposed to provide a good example for a pair of superhuman twins?! They do so freaking well at all their work, it's just not fair! I'm so thrilled for them, I really am! They were so nervous about their results and now it is over. They are going off with some of their friends to celebrate in Melville tonight. I have to go fetch them tomorrow around 1am which I'm not too pleased about but I think they deserve it.

On top of it all, they got an article about them printed in the newspaper! All about their results and how tough the year had been on them. It was really odd to open up the newspaper and see my sisters on the page in front of me!

I didn't sleep well beause of the fact that a friend of mine, Xena (not her real name) was coming over today at 10am to make some jingles for her new radio program that she will be doing. It'll be on some online radio and will be a relationship advice show. Her, Duncan and I had come up with the jingles some time ago but now had to actually produce them. Duncan is off at the coast somewhere at the moment on holiday so he couldn't be here.

Anyhoo, the point is that when I know that I have to get up for something specific, as was the case today, I can't get to sleep properly and so I don't sleep very well.

The End.

BTW, Helen phoned to congratulate my sisters, which was funny...

Christmas merry making

Hi guys! A belated Merry Christmas to you all! I hope that you all had a brilliant festive season filled with love and joy, and of course, presents!

I have been doing a lot of thinking of late about all kinds of things. I usually do most of this thinking while driving people places. My sisters still do not have their driving licences and so I act as the family driver. I've done SO much driving over the last week, it's not even funny! Most of it was for the transporting of people to go and buy presents and things but it's really been tiring. Especially when my sister sends me off to buy some earings for our other sister with this flawless description: 'They look like they could be sweets'

Now, normally, this kind of thing would be enough for me to go by but on this occasion, the store that I was sent to happened to be one of the local accessory shops called 'Claire's'. Now, as I'm sure many a South African girl, and guy, can tell you, almost everything in that store looks like it could be sweets! So invariably, I bought the wrong thing and had to return them for some other ones. To my relief, it turned out that the ones that my sister had intended that I buy were all sold out anyway and so I wasn't completely useless!

But other than this little sidetrack, I've been thinking about my life, my friends and family and just what a jump it's going to be to go from honours into masters. The problem lies in the fact that in honours, we had an office in which we all had our desks and we all worked. Technically we had three offices because we had a very big honours group. But in Masters, we all work on our own and in our own labs and things.

It's going to be really sad not seeing all the other people all the time and not getting to sit and gossip through our lunch break eating spring rolls from the ever-so-slightly-dodgy chinese place. Also, Sarah (abfablife.blogspot.com) won't be around anymore. She is studying international relations and technically shouldn't have been near our building but she moved into our office and we loved having her around to sing things down the corridor and act as the buffer between Rob, one of the other students, and the rest of us. (We love you Rob and we're gonna miss you! Buya!)

Another person who I'll miss is Marlien. She wasn't in our office but she often visited us and she was one of us crazy people that often remained at Wits long after we should have left to work. Her fiance (I really have no clue how it is spelt) was also always around and it was so cool to have them there to go and bug when you were feeling particularly ADHD or when you felt like going to get pizza from Debonairs before they closed at 7:00pm.

There are many more of you who I shan't name simply because it would bore the crap out of my hordes of adoring fans (Thanks guys! I love you too!) but I'll miss you all none the less! That bit about the fans was sarcasm, by the way.

The other thing that I'm thinking about is the direction th-

Damn...I have to go mow the lawn. Sorry. I'll have to continue this rant later.

The photo for today is of the farmer-from-Darling's dog. His name was Andy, the dog, not the farmer, and he had one blue eye and one brown eye. I LOVE him! Again, the dog, not the farmer. The farmer was terribly nice though but I doubt that I'd be able to say the same about him, what with barely knowing the man and all...

I love the rain

Hi guys

It is raining right now. I think that that is one of those things in the world that is keeping me semisane. In the words of Natalie Portman as Eevee in the brilliant movie 'V for Vendetta', "God is in the rain." I really feel like that sometimes. There is nothing I like more than walking in the rain. And not the kind of walking in the rain that most people do, as in wearing waders and carrying an umbrella around, but instead I prefer to go walking with no protective measures. Naturally you do run the risk of...gasp! getting wet, but I feel that that is part of the experience and that you should just let yourself get wet and enjoy it!

The best thing is to go to sleep or wake up when it's raining. Lying in bed watching the rain running down the plants in the garden and smelling that amazing smell that comes with rain is just so beautiful to me. It is something that I really miss during winter (we are in a summer rainfall region) and when we were zooming around the country.

In Kamieskroon we had one day in particular which was terrible! We had done all that was necessary for that day and we were simply waiting for time to elapse so that we could go and check the traps we had set out. We were all in the car trying to keep our bodies out of the sun. I'm telling you all of this because it has to have been the hottest day of my life!

We were literally paralised in the car! We couldn't do anything at all! We couldn't lift our arms, we couldn't bare to keep our shoes on and eventually we all just fell asleep! We all decided that the temperature must have exceeded 40 degrees celcius that day but I suspect that it may have been closer to 50. We had a day in the Kalahari when the temperature in the shade was 45 and that wasn't nearly as bad as that day.

Overall, Kamieskroon is a very hot place. And there is nothing to do there at all! So pretty much every day we went to the only supermarket in the whole town to buy ourselves drinks. And they were so cheap there! It was great! You could buy yourself a whole litre of fanta for R6, AND get R2 back as a deposit on the bottle if you returned it after you'd finished! So essentially, you were paying R4 for a litre of fanta! To put this into perspective, in Joburg, most of the time you can't get a 340ml can of fanta for less than R4.50.

Well, the rain seems to have let up so I'm going to go and have a swim. If you live in the Southern Hemisphere and are able, you should go and have a swim right now! Even if it is at night! There is nothing more exsilirating than going for a dip at night.

Hello world! This is me...

I can't believe that after all this time, my first instinct is still to write out that stupid line!

Well gang, I have finally returned from my month of galavanting around the country digging for a German's research. It was really such an experience! We first went off to Darling, a small town half an hour north of Cape Town. It took us 21 hours to get there from Pretoria, a trip which should have taken 14 hours at the most. It took so long because of the fact that the vehicle we were using was completely messed up. There was something wrong with the battery and it was severly overdue for a service; about 6000km overdue.

Darling was really interesting for me because, as someone who has lived their whole life in a city, going to a small town was very strange. Firstly, the small town sense of humour is...odd to say the least. They seem to find small things hysterically funny. Secondly, they are incredibly generous and warm! If someone I had been staying with in Joburg wanted to hug me goodbye after knowing them for a week, I would be mildly freaked out and wonder what is going on inside their heads. But somehow, when the wife of the farmer whose farm we were staying on hugged us all goodbye, it was perfectly fine. Thirdly, small town folk are easily entertained.

A good example is what transpired one evening at the home of an orchid farmer who is a relative of the people who hosted us. This guy and the son of our hosts had organised a kind of welcome braai (barbeque for you who have no clue what I'm on about) for us at the house of the orchid farmer. The evening began fairly normally and we drank quite a lot of wine. We ended up eating very late and soon after feeding, we were joined by some other people from Darling. How they fitted into the general social equation completely eludes me.

Anyway, we all had some more to drink and got to know each other. One was a local resident and the other was a German who had come over here for work or something. The only thing that I really remeber about him was that the German who we were with was really not impressed with him. After some more drinks, our host, the orchid farmer, decided to put some music on. He asked us if we would mind his 1930's jazz and blues. We said we were happy with that and he proceeded to put on the music. The problem was, that it was not 1930's jazz and blues! It was Abba and Westlife and all kinds of horrid sounds! What made things so much worse was the fact that he then insisted on playing along to all of it on his piano! It was aweful!

Helen, Nicole and I were all in fits of giggles! All the others seemed to be thoroughly enjoying it all! They were all dancing, in a sort of dancing-in-someones-livingroom-is-silly-so-I'll-just-kind-of-sway-my-hips-like-a-complete-fruitbasket-instead kind of way. This certainly didn't help to bring the giggles under control. The German guy was particularly keen on the Beach Boys.

Eventually, we went home after signing the orchid guy's visitors book (yes, he has a visitors book...FOR HIS HOUSE!), and I had somehow developed hiccups and was rather tipsy. It was rather embarassing because the guy giving us a lift was convinced that I was going to throw up all over his car but I was fine. And trying to convince someone that you are not going to do the technicolour yawn in his car when you have hiccups isn't easy. Everytime you say something you pack up in fits of giggles because it's so funny that you hiccuped!

The morning after, the farmer's wife (the guy we were staying with, not the orchid guy) came and asked us if the orchid guy had played piano for us. When we responded in the affirmative, she rattled on about how it was so beautiful when he did that and how she loved to visit him just so that he could play for her...Hence the fact that they are all easily amused.

And I think that that is enough of a rant for today. I leave you with a photo of one of the holes that I dug in an attempt to find a molerat tunnel. It was big enough to bury someone in and, as it turned out, was a fruitless venture.

See yawl!

Jelly-legs

Well guys, I am currently barely able to remain upright on my legs. As Helen already blogged, on Thursday a whole herd of us wits students went off to play paintball! It was awesome! I felt terrible though because I accidentally shot Kathleen! She is a pacifist and was only there to take photos. I didn't see that it was her, I only saw a head with a mask on and so I assumed it to be the enemy and opened fire. I hit her on the mask...a thousand appologies Kathleen! I got shot over 20 times and each shot seemed to sting more than the last but I would do it again any day! My back is currently covered in large ring-bruises (thanks to Oliver - you underhanded dog you! ;-) ) but that is not my problem! My legs are SO sore that I can't bend them!

The problem is that I have been sitting infront of a computer all year and so I have not really used those muscles in my legs for about 8 months! I nearly fell over when I tried to get out of bed on Friday morning! So, I have made a decission to try and get fit this holiday. I've been swimming a lot since the exams ended. I mainly do butterfly because it seems to be the most exhausting, so I figure that is must be doing me the most good...

The photo for today is of Laura looking annoyed at the camera, held by Vanessa, as I dish up our dinner. It was from our first Wits run field trip. It was for a course where we had to make and insect and plant collection. We were the only ones that had made pasta for dinner! All the rest of the normal people had brought things like 2 min noodles or cup-o-soup. We even had salad with kroutons! That's what happens when Laura is in charge of catering. Don't get me wrong, it was great! We arrived at this place, called Ezemvelo, and from the second that we stepped off the bus to when we got back onto it two days later, it poured. I have never been so wet in all my life! It got to the point where as I walked, water would gush out of my shoes, but in the time between lifting my foot and putting it down for the next step they would fill up with water again! It was such fun!

On the last night, we were all so wet and tired of running around looking for flowers that we all climbed onto a single air matress (spelling?) and didn't move all night. There were about 5 or 6 of us all crammed onto a 2.5m x 2.5m matress. It was snug to say the least. On the last day I had to borrow some tracksuit pants from Laura because I didn't have a single dry item of clothing left. For weeks afterward, we made jokes about me getting into Laura's pants. We all thought that they were hysterical but in hindsight, they weren't all that funny.

Sometimes this site is REALLY dumb!

I just tried to log in and the website kept saying that my computer was blocking the cookies from Blogger. So it suggested that I alter my security settings, which I did. I set them higher and it let me in! How does that make any sense?

Today was really nice because for the first time in a very long time, I spent a good part of my day outside, in the sun, playing with the dogs and swimming. It was really nice and I realised how much I've missed it.

I did go in to Wits today to speak to Neville about some of the stuff I found out at the zoo the other day (When I finally learnt all the chimps ACTUAL names). He came up with a really cool idea for enrichment of the chimp enclosure that would encourage them to use more of the space. I elaborated on it so that it'll become a great way to increase the amount of time that the chimps are occupied and make them use more of their space. In short, they should be happier at the end of it all.

I also gave Neville a thank-you/christmas gift for all the stuff he's helped me with this year and put up with. He was chuffed.

Tomorrow I'm off to go and play paintball for the first time in my life! It's kinda scary considering all the horror stories I've heard about people losing eyes and bruises that remain with you for your life etc...I'm rather psyched on the other hand and I'm sure it will be awesome! Some of the Honours people refuse to come or participate (TAO! - we all want to shoot this one in particular!)

Anyhoo, it's 22:45 and I'm feeling really tired so I'm going off to bed. Yes, I know I'm like an old man but I haven't been sleeping lately and so I'm really tired. Hopefully tonight I can get a good night's sleep!

By the way, the pic today is of a tree from Suikerbosrand that I took a photo of. We named it something but for the life of me I cannot remember what it was called.

Afterthought: I finally have the first Chicane album! It's awesome!

My current best-restaurant-of-all-time!

Does this photo remind anyone else of the surface of the sphinx in Egypt?

Well guys, as the title suggests, today I was introduced to my new and current favourite-eatery-of-all-time! It is none other than Kuwai (Spelling?). I'm allowed to spell it wrong because I've never been there before.

They make the most amazing food! It was...wow...I had something that had lots of humus on it and pepperdews and stuff which was delicious! And they have the only smoothies on the planet that I have ever actually liked! I had something with lots of mango in it and it was brilliant!

I would like to thank Laura and Sarah for broadening my horizons with todays lunch. I am eternally indebted to you!

And the best part of this amazing place is that the vast majority of their food is vegetarian friendly! There is a lot of vegan stuff too! Thus, it is also automatically healthy! Hooray! Finally, good food, that's healthy!

We all (Laura, Sarah, Helen, EEbEE and I) went to the movies today to see 'An inconvenient truth'. It was rather good except for the fact that the movie was primarily about how the first world was going to be affected by global warming. It appears that the REST OF HUMANKIND that lives elsewhere, will be entirely unaffected by the phenomenon.

I must admit that it makes me glad that I live in Joburg. At nearly 2000m above sea level, we're not likely to get flooded any time soon. Kind of ironic when you think that many of the people of this country can trace their ancestory back to the dutch and Holland is going to be completely wiped out by the warming!

In other news, I went off to the zoo again today and was taken on a tour of the new reptile enclosure (which hasn't opened to the public yet!). It looks amazing! I also got to go into the back of the chimp and orangutan enclosures! The orang is scary! He is massive! His middle finger is as thick as three of mine combined!

That's all...

The scary photo!

The Scary Halloween photo finally posted! Hooray!

OH my golly-gosh people of this small green and blue planet! I have nearly finished my honours degree! I'm not going to get used to this any time soon…It may seem incredibly odd to the rest of you but I am really rather freaked out by this thing of having finished! Helen and Eebee can attest to this as they suffered through the whole of Friday lunch with me going on about how cool it was that we had finished and did they realise that we were nearly done and that this was a major milestone in our lives and that we were finished and... (You get the idea)

Coincidentally, I have never been so tired in all my life! I haven’t had a good nights sleep in I don’t know how long! Speaking of which, I’m also losing track of time…It’s rather surreal to be told about something and think that it happened months ago and then realise that it only happened yesterday.

Oh my gas! I’ve also put on 5kg’s since the beginning of the year! I’m going to have to work it off. I really hate exercising so this is going to be tough…I’m sure many of you can sympathise. Exercising sucks! And I have all these papers that say that research has shown that exercising releases endorphins, which makes you happy. I think they may have conveniently left out the bit where all their study subjects were fed chocolate while running on the treadmill and THAT’s where all the endorphins came from! But seriously, I can’t get excited about jogging or cycling or anything…except perhaps swimming. I enjoy that, but in a more ‘I’m going to pretend to be a piece of driftwood and see where I end up’ kind of way.

I used to do swimming in school. In primary school I loved it and was on the swimming team and everything. I went to swimming training with some woman who used to be a friend of my mom’s from high school. I then arrived at high school, hated the idea of achieving anything in the name of school and stopped. I was forced a few times to swim in the school gala, once as a result of a practical joke on the part of a friend of mine. I was not impressed…

Wow…today I really can’t keep my mind on a single thing! ADD in a bad way…

So, what I’ve been up to lately…Well, on Friday I went with Helen to try and see if I couldn’t do some behaviour sampling for my Masters project. The chimps were not out and so I decided to take the rest of the day off and go home. I did that and swam a bit. That evening I went out for the first time in…I dunno, but the point is it’s been a long time! I went with Duncan and David to ‘Frankie Bananas’ here in Bedfordview. I’ve been there before with some of my colleagues from when I used work at M&A. It was cool then, not too crowded, but this time it was packed and it was full of the typical pretentious Bedfordview rich kids. Not cool. So, instead, we went off to the new club (I say new because it’s new to me) called ‘la Boom’ at Wild waters in Boksburg.

Yes, I ashamedly admit that I occasionally go to the ‘far east’ to party…

It was actually not bad. The crowd was a little I’m-16-but-I’ll-pretend-to-be-23-and-nobody-will-know, but I had fun. I loved their toilet signs. The theme for the place is sort-of South American…or something…and they have these signs outside the toilets that say ‘senoritas’ and ‘senoras’. Now, if my limited Spanish knowledge serves me well, senoritas means young girls and senoras means women. So technically, they have no men’s room! I think that they think that senoras is men, but it should be senores.

Anyhoo, Saturday I got up and went off to the zoo with my sister who came along as my time-keeper. She was a brilliant assistant. Don’t worry Helen, I’ll make the CD for timing…
After returning, we went off to return the DVD my sisters took out from the video store the night before and ended up getting two more DVD’s. My sisters insisted on getting ‘School of Rock’ again. I’ve seen it 4 or 5 times now and it is becoming a little tiring to watch over and over. My sisters think that it is the most amazing movie on the planet and can’t seem to get enough of it. I got something called ‘Bagdad Café’ which is really good! It is amazingly shot and tells a rather simple story in a beautiful way. I recommend it to all!

Then, today I went to church which was really tough as I fought to remain conscious. It wasn’t as long as I was expecting, which was nice, but the worship was horrid! Tone-deaf people should not be appointed to the position of lead singer in the worship team! What were they thinking! After that we all went to tea with my grandmother and then Gemma and I went off to the zoo again. There we discovered that I had been calling all the chimps by the wrong names. It was a little embarrassing.

My sister and I had a bit of a REALLY BLIND moment later. We were supposed to fetch my gran from my aunt’s house at 15:00 and we finished at the zoo at 14:30. So we thought we should simply fetch her straight away. The trip should have taken about 30 min anyway but as it was Sunday, shortly after lunch, everyone was off the roads. So, it took us 10min. And so, despite our attempts to get stopped at every traffic light, we arrived 20 min early. We decided rather than to show up 20 min early, to go and get a cool drink from the petrol station up the road and chill for 15. We did this and went to fetch her.

Hmm…I guess you had to be there.

That’s all for now! I’m off to write my book report for tomorrow! Have a good one people!

Finally done: take 2

I'm very tempted to write out that 'Hello world...this is me...' line again.

Well guys, I sent off my stuff to Neville last night and he sent me back the stuff from two days ago. I always expect the worst when recieving comments on my work from him and so today when I opened the file I kept chanting 'It's gonna be bad' in my mind. So I opened the file and found a comment at the bottom that basically said that what I had spent all day typing up on Monday was completely off topic and had to be rewritten. This was my introduction and seeing as my discussion section, which I completed yesterday and was rather chuffed about, is based on my intro, that has to be rewritten too. I wanted to cry.

It was bizzare because usually, I would get really annoyed that he had said that but this time, I just wanted to die instead. Don't worry, I'm not suicidal...

So I spent the whole day today rewriting my intro. I finished it about half an hour ago, at around 10:00pm. So, tomorrow I shall go and see Neville, find out which parts of my discussion I can salvage and then rewrite that. Then I shall send it off to him, have it ripped to shreds again, rewrite it and send it off for the last time, print three copies, bind them, create a *.pdf file of the whole thing, hand them all in and go off to Helen's house to go get smashed. Then the only things I'll have left until my honours year is over will be my two outstanding essays (not outstanding as in good), the two exams I have to write consecutively, a book review and a stats project! There is light at the end of the tunnel!

Blogger hates my photos...it won't let me upload again. Boo...

Well, that's all for now! I'll blog again when I'm able. How was everyone's Halloween?

Finally done...

Well guys, I've done it! I have written up the last section of my report, my discussion section! I'm almost free of this horrible project! Well actually, it's not been all that horrible. Writing up is just horrible, not the rest of the project. Driving around for hours in Suikerbosrand is horrible when you don't see any baboons and your academic career depends on it. But the rest of the project isn't too bad.

Now, just to wait for Helen to let me know whether she is proof reading it for me or not and then I can send it off to my supervisor and be free of it! Until tomorrow morning that is...

I'm so excited about the end of this year! I can't wait to go catch mole-rats again! It'll be in the desert! Hooray!

Brain is fried...will write again when I can actually come up with more interesting sentences than 'It'll be in the desert!'...

Happy Halloween all...

(I tried to put in a scary photo of me, from when I had long hair, for Halloween...but alas blogger won't let me, so you'll have to ask me individually to send it to you if you really want to see it...)

My 62nd post!

Hello world...this is me...life could be...fun for everyone!

Sorry, those are some lyrics from a song that I heard a VERY long time ago and suddenly popped into my head as I was typing. It was by some random chick called 'Vitamen C' or something...who knows...

I have been reading like a mad thing for the last...3 days and came in to Wits today to fix up all my results so that I can rewrite that section of my report. It's been great fun (Sarcasm...)! This is one of my pretty graphs. Now, if only I could figure out what the hell is going on in it...

So, I arrived at Wits and went to say hi to Helen who has also been furiously working away at her results. EEbEE arrived too and we chatted for a while. We all then went our (I momentarily couldn't spell separate) separate ways and worked for a bit.

After some angst over trying to get the stupid computer to print, I decided that it was lunch time. So I went to tell Helen to stop working and get ready for lunch. I also went to call EEbEE but had to go to the loo first. On my way back from the loo, I went and knocked on the door to EEbEE's room. Just then, I realised that I could hear him talking to Helen in her lab so I walked of to chat to them. Half way there I heard someone walking through EEbEE's room to answer the door. So, being my irrational and silly self, I thought that I couldn't let the person see that it was me who had knocked on their door, and so, scampered down the passage to Helen's lab.

In hindsight, I realise that that was really silly of me and that I probably should have just owned up to my heinous crime of...knocking on the door...

As I spun around the corner into Helen's lab I found out from EEbEE that the person in the other room was Lindo, who had only just gotten to sleep after staying awake all night! I feel terrible...

So we went off to lunch and got Falafels from the 'Anat falafel' in Campus Square. They were AMAZING! I've not had one for so long that I had forgotten just how good they could be...mmmmm...

Three hours later, we returned to Wits to continue our work (it took so long because we ended up on a mission to find me a 'Vanilla Coke' and ended up discussing various foodstuffs available for purchase at the 'Pick-n-Pay' as well as buying various different types of tea). I then did all my graphs and am now on my way home to work on writing up all this nonsense!

Have a smashing weekend world!

How do you do something good for someone you dislike...?

My current predicament is not as serious as the title of this post sounds. I have to produce two essays for my current theory topic and I am TOTALLY disinterested! The one lecturer is an asshole and his contribution to the course just left me feeling really lost and my brain was fried! I'm supposed to write this essay for him but I can't even think of what my topic should be...I mean, I've got a rough topic already but I can't think of what angle I should use...

Well, this week has been horrible. I've had so much work to do. I'm really worried that I'm not going to be able to finish in time for the end of the year! My supervisor came to see me yesterday and did the whole, "Should I be expecting some work from you?" thing.

On the flipside, I'm currently house-sitting for my aunt and uncle which is always fun! They have a heated pool! I have yet to try it out because yesterday, when I got to the house, it was raining and I was so tired that I simply went to bed. I awoke this morning to discover that their gardener had somehow let himself in and was rumageing through the flowerbeds. It was a little awkward because I don't know him from a bar of soap and had to go out to feed the dog. So I introduced myself to him and ended up having quite a conversation about the merits of not drinking and smoking. It was arb...

Anyhoo, I have to go home to get some lunch and start working on THE essay. Have a great weekend internutters!

PS: The photo has nothing to do with anything. I just think Zebra are cute!

Josh!!!!He's SO cute!!!

I have had the honour to see the baby chimp named Josh. He is the illegitimate progeny of a chimp owned by the Joburg Zoo and another on loan from the Jane Goodall institute. And he is SO cute! Here is a photo of a baby chimp:

Isn't it ADORABLE!!! Sorry, its my paternal instincts coming out here...

Anyhoo, today was rather dull...I went off to church with my family minus mom. She stayed at home to do...something...I don't know what. Church was rather odd. I have really been questioning my belief lately and I'm still not 100% which side of the fence I'm on. I mean, what if this is all that there is? This whole thing is really getting to me mostly because my parents are such religious zealots...okay, maybe not zealots, but they are pretty close! It's just irritating.

The other thing that is bugging me about the situation at the moment is that (Helen, you don't have to read this - we've discussed this before) I have many ideas and beliefs that conflict with those of my family. This would be fine if it weren't for the fact that my family are as openminded as a rock, so any opinion that I voiced would be torn to shreds and I would be left to bleed out.

I believe in evolution, to begin with. I don't see how evolution and God can't coexist. They are completely separate things! To begin with, God is an entity, evolution is a process, just like digestion is a process. You don't have christians running around declairing that digestion is evil just because there is no direct link between what happens in our stomach and God...Second, there is tons of proof for evolution and in contrast, there isn't all that much proof to say that the world was created in literally 7 days.

Another thing that I don't agree with is the whole homosexuality thing. I don't beleive that god could reject people based on a psychological issue they have! There is so much research that has gone into this and has shown that homosexuality is caused by genetic predisposition (to a minor degree) and the results of experiences of the people as they develop. So is God really going to say to someone at the end, 'Sorry but because your father didn't show you the right amount of attention when you were between one and four months old, you can't come in to heaven...'!? It's not even their fault!

Sorry, but this is all because of something that the pastor said today in church. He said that the church should rise up against gay rights and same sex marriges. Not that they are gay-haters, but they just don't think that there is any place for homosexuality in the world.

Idiot.

As we speak (not that we are), my father is on the phone to a friend of ours in England, talking about attrocities in the church...

Sorry Travis and Jeff but this is just how I feel right now. I'm not attacking you, I just feel that christians should be a little more openminded and use that beautiful organ God put into our skulls.

-

I finished my essay for Ecophysiology that is due for a months time, or something! Hooray! Now I only have to work on the one that's due for next week friday and the other two, my final project writeup and my exams and I'm scotfree!

Well now that my theroputic rant is over, I'm off! Have a smashing rest-of-weekend! Cheerio!

PS: I saw the movie 'Domino' last night...it's VERY violent and weird...

Don't do it!

Don't EVER take two theory topic in the last block of your honours year! Even if someone pays you to or promises you a small island off the coast of Costa Rica...DON'T DO IT!!!

A soothing photo of a South African sunset to calm the nerves...

Well all as some of you may have noticed, I have not updated in something like a million years. This is due to the fact that the more sadistic side in me thought it would be funny to slowly kill me by drowning me in work.

On the upside, I heard from a friend of mine the most hysterical story about how I got my middle name, Mangaliso (All the APES people can cease reading from here down).

Apparently, it all began when my parents came to South Africa on holiday. My mother was alledgedly pregnant with me at the time. For their supposed trip here, they had a tour guide by the name of...wait for it...MANGALISO! Now, he supposedly did such an amazing job of showing them around, that before leaving to return to their home in Italy,my parents swore to name their first son after the brilliant tour guide that made their holiday so special. Upon my parents apparent arrival back in Italy, I popped out and was named accordingly.

The truth of it all is that:

1. My parents lived their entire lives here in sunny South Africa. They only went to live in Italy in 1999.
2. I was born here at the Johannesburg General Hospital (dodgy, I know!) and never set foot in Italy until I was 13.
3. My name comes from the fact that my dad was one of the liberals that had a huge bone to pick with the Apartheid government and so as an act of deffiance, gave his son a (*Gasp*) 'black name'.

My parents never go on holiday anyway so this never could have happened. And, for those who are wondering, Mangaliso means blessing or miracle.

The end

Another weekend at the workplace

Hi all!

Yes, I am spending another weekend here at Wits instead of at home because I have too much work to get through. At the moment, I have two essays to do and a portion of my final writeup. The road seems very long...

At the moment here at Wits we are having an exhibit of all things natural and alive. It's called 'Yebo Gogga, Yebo amaBlomo' and happens every year. It's usually really cool and quite fun but unfortunately I can't really go check it out this time due to the above. I usually go help out and spend most of my time there showing school kids around and explaining stuff. I dumped my family there today and they seem to be enjoying it so far...

Anyway, I am off to go and see if Helen and interpret my statistics because I sure as hell have no clue what they mean!

Have a GREAT weekend!

Adios

The end is nigh!

Holy crap people! Hierdie jaar het vinnig weg gegaan! I really should be heading off to bed but I thought I should just do a quick post...

For you who are not in the AP&ES dept. or don't see me practically every day...or ever for that matter, tomorrow is the day that we have to give our end-of-year presentations on our honours projects. We are, or at least ought to be, shitting bricks at the moment.

I really know that I shouldn't be worried about it as I rather enjoy presentations but somehow always get into that whole oh-crap-I'm-going-to-have-to-stand-up-infront-of-all-those-people groove...It is really silly, I know.

Speaking of which, I love 'Scrubs'! It is brilliant! I watched season one today when I should have been working!

Well enough of that, I'm really off to bed now.

Wish me luck!

Oh my gas 2: The sequal

All I can say is, oh my gas. My mother has completely lost her mind...

I arrived home today rather late from university as I had to prep 7 dung samples in the hopes that they will be dry by Saturday and I'll never have to do any more dung analysis ever again. I was greeted at the door by my sister who had come to let the dog out. I entered the house as Gogga, the dog, pranced around my feet and occasionally crashed into stuff. As I rounded the corner into my room I noticed something odd. There was a large grey plastic packet on my bed.

I approached the packet cautiously, half expecting it to explode, half expecting it to contain loads of sweets with a corny note saying, 'For our sweet son'. It's the kind of thing my parents would do. The sweets...not leaving bombs on my bed for when I get home.

I looked in. It was full of plastic containers. For a second I was perplexed. It then hit me like a nursery school bully...

It was dietary suppliments! My mother has consulted her boss, the dietitian, about the fact that I am stressed at the moment and has organised me millions of pills and brightly coloured capsules to ease the stress of my everyday existence!

Don't get me wrong. I'm not ungrateful, nor am I opposed to taking vitamen and mineral suppliments. But I think that taking a total of up to 38 pills daily (even number sarah!) is a tad excessive! The doctor even gave me a timetable of how and when to take them! It includes a line about the importance of remaining regular, if you know what I mean...

So from now on I have to prep little party-packs of vitamens, zinc and calcium to take with me to Wits to have with my lunch. I practically don't have to eat anymore!

On the flip side, I watched my first-ever episode of 'Scrubs' today. It was REALLY funny! I need the box set...

Another thing that happened today was really awkward. I was in the honours room trying to work and I realised that Laura and Jason (her boyfriend) were making out in the honours room, behind some other peoples desks! It was horrible! I tried really hard to concentrate but I kept on hearing all these wet slurping and poping sounds with random rubbing sounds every now and again! It was so...eeeuuglh! Sarah and Margaret thought that it was all very funny when I told them...

Well, it's late and I have to write a Stats report tomorrow so I'm going to sleep now. It's so cool having a laptop and being able to sit in bed and surf the internut at the same time! Hooray!

I really wish I could get angry...

I've had a really bad day. It has made me wish I could be like most people and get really angry, kick something and feel better. I can't. It sucks. A good cry every now and again helps though...

Why the hell this still comes as a surprise to me is somewhat baffling but, blogger won't let me upload a photo!

I REALLY don't have time to post today but I thought that I should mention that yesterday, Helen was my knight in shining armour who saved

me from the perils of traffic by sending me directions as I tried to navigate my way from Ravonia to Wits without taking the highway. Spanks Helen!

It appears that the computer somehow sensed my current mood and decided that it probably was a good idea to cooperate (for once) and post my photo!

The point of this is to show just how amazing the sea is. I mean, who can honestly say that this image doesn't appeal to them on some level! I took this photo on my mini-holiday-ete (it was only three days of which I could only speak for one due to a brilliantly timed *and my first ever* case of larangitis).

Oh my gas!

Hi all!

I have a little bitching to do but I'll get it out of the way so that I can write happy things.

-Begin Bitch-

I spent 4 hours in the car today driving around! It has TOTALLY ruined my day! I hate other people on the road! Why can't they all live and work in another country or something! Bloody hell! The worst part was that it took me 2 hours to get my mom to work and then a measly half an hour to get to Wits! And there are so many idiots on the road that seem to think that somehow, by driving right up your arse, they'll get to work 5 min sooner...

It really makes you wonder about natural selection...I mean surely if natural selection actually worked, all the stupid people in the world would not be reproducing. However, by simply walking out of your house, the evidence says otherwise.

-End Bitch-

I really miss the sea at the moment. I realise how silly that may sound but I haven't had a holiday all year and the ocean has a particular place in my heart. Does anyone out there get me on this? I know Sarah loathes the beach for cullinary reasons (it interferes with sandwiches). I think that the sea is the most awesome place I've ever been to. I have a feeling that a rainforest may compete with the beach on the awesomeness scale but I've never been to one so I can't say for sure. I've heard that rainforests are not all as cool as they seem on TV. They have millions of bugs and parasites and stuff that makes life in them generally unpleasant.

Random, I know, but my laptop fixed itself last night! It was wonderful! It has had this trojan on it for ages that I knew was there but my antivirus software refused to recognise. I tried a million things to remove it but nothing seemed to work. Then, last night for no apparent reason, my laptop just decided to recognise it and do something about it! It was brilliant!

I'm trying to post a video that I took on my last trip to the ocean but it doesn't seem to want to work...Sorry...Blogger hates me...

Thats all for today kiddies! I'm starving and so I'm off to see what has happened to dinner...

Adios!

I'm here now!

Greetings

I have just returned from the funny workshop thing that I mentioned in the previous post. It was dumb. I did however get my quote of the day from it. It was said by a rather odd and daft sounding individual whose first name was Petrus and whose surname obviously didn't warrent space in my limited memory. He said:

'The tree are pumping up water, like a water pump'

I hosed myself! The other thing was that I was giggleing to myself, next to one of the only Afrikaans people I know, Marlien. It was really akward, but not that bad because then she told me how she loved ripping him off because of his inability to utilise the English language. That was all during talk number 4.

The first talk seemed to have no particular purpose. Some ex-Witsie stood up and went on about the media and something or other. I was enthralled as I'm sure you can tell from the astounding detail in my description. The most prominent thing that I can remember from her talk was that she said that she probably drank too many ciders while at Wits.

Talk two was from a woman who was very green. She was wearing this lumo-green thing and it made her stick out hectically! It was made so much worse by the fact that she was really loud, verbally. She did this talk thing on her company, Food and Trees for Africa. It all sounds like a really good idea but can potentially lead to massive problems in future if it is not governed properly.

I would like to take this oportunity to make a small shout out to my pal, Pinky!

The third one was by some lady who claimed to have discovered numerous things that are basically common knowledge. These included a particular type of plant, that gorilla's live in the Congo and that they are endangered as well as the fact that botanical gardens are actually Zoos for plants. She also ranted about how her supervisor refused to let her continue her study...It was dumb.

I may have tick-bite fever...

The rest of the talks were really rather inconsequential.

Today in a lecture, our lecturer was trying to explain to us just how it was that birds urine is collected. In case you are wondering why this should be a problem, birds only have one opening on the 'other end'. So, they don't urinate or deficate, they do both at the same time!

Anyhoo, he was explaing to us how this all worked and started off by saying, "You have to take a small tube, cut a hole near the top of it and insert the tube into...wait, let me show you." He then stood up. We all recoiled in horror, expecting him to drop his pants and shove something up his ass. It turned out he wanted to draw a diagram on the white board.

We were relieved...

And thus, concludes my latest post. I hope that it has lived up to your expectations! Have a brilliant day!

Stupid mechanic...

Hi all

I realise that I did promise to post last night and failed to do so. I'm sorry. I was just so incredibly tired and I'd had a bad day of note so I went to bed instead. I will have to create a proper post later today because I have to go off to a workshop on biological control. It looks interesting and I really enjoyed the biocontrol stuff I did last year so I'm sure I'll enjoy this one.

The title refers to the idiot mechanic that alledgedly fixes my car. He was supposed to fix my breaks which were not entirely 100% functional and yesterday I was nearly in an accident as a result of his "fixing" the breaks.

Anyhoo, I'll write again later!

Have a great day!