Have you ever tasted real milk? I’m not talking about the insipid, 0% fat, homogenised milk you buy from your local supermarket. I’m as city slicker as they come, but after a trip to the local petting farm (Sleepy Hollow, are you still there?) in primary school, I drank milk straight from the cow.
Lifestyle
Posted inLifestyle, Media, News/Politics, Sport
Generalisations of the year
Everybody knows generalisations are the heartbeat of truth. Leonard Cohen, the greatest living poet, said: “Everybody knows the dice are loaded, everybody rolls with their fingers crossed, everybody knows that the war is over, everybody knows that the good guys lost.” So the panel of pundits at TopEditor have put together the generalisations of 2007 […]
Posted inLifestyle, Media
How to sell your soul in 10 easy steps
Assume I have no conscience or any morals. Assume I have a legitimately registered company or CC with hefty overdraft facilities. Here I am in South Africa just ready to make a buck from those most gullible of consumers — the worried (but wealthy) well, the health and wellness neurotics, the painted, dyed and cosmetic-dependent […]
Posted inLifestyle, News/Politics, Sport, Tech
2008: A sneaky preview
Here’s what the coming year has in store for us, courtesy of Nostradamus’s greasy little ball. In January Saru announces what they call a “compromise candidate” to take over the role of Springbok coach. It is Andre Markgraaff, the former disgraced coach of telephone-tap/racist-comments fame.
Posted inLifestyle, News/Politics
Living in interesting times
There is a Chinese curse about living in interesting times, and that has certainly been the case in South Africa this past year. The year 2007 will no doubt go down in South Africa as the year of Jacob Zuma. Internationally there were some other major events, such as the assassination of former Pakistani prime […]
Posted inBusiness, General, Lifestyle, News/Politics, Tech
Ten Predictions for 2008
Hillary Clinton will become the 44th US president on November 4 2008 and if she is wise and the world is fortunate she will select Barack Obama as her vice-president or appoint him to a senior position dealing with internal US policies. The world will shift intense and expensive efforts focused on HIV and Aids […]
Posted inLifestyle
The corners of her eyes
This weekend I had two windows broken in my house. The first was a braaiing accident when, after a couple of toots, I stumbled with a plastic chair in my hands and two of the chair legs went through a glass pane. The second breakage was an act of God when we had some strong […]
Posted inBusiness, General, Lifestyle
Service in South Africa: Heroes and zeros
South Africa has one of the worst service ethoses in the world. I’m trying to think which nation in the world that I have travelled to is worse and can’t. And yes, I deliberately avoid Nigeria, there is just so much trauma I’m prepared to experience in one lifetime.
Posted inLifestyle
A rhinestone Xmas
DAMN! I tried so hard to have a happy Christmas, but the best I managed was a somewhat disjointed crazy kinds-in-the-kitchen porridge of highs and lows. I can’t say I expected much from Christmas itself. Since I’ve aged and grown more and more disillusioned with the general direction this most glorious of lands is taking, […]
Posted inLifestyle
Cyberlover, privacy tsars and the Jewish husband
Earlier this month a Russian chatbot called Cyberlover began appearing on online dating services. The idea behind it being to get unwitting “clients” to give their personal details away, thereby opening themselves up to all kinds of fraud and theft. Ingenious. Of course the leaking of data is becoming a major concern the world over, […]
Posted inLifestyle
Tony Blair’s a Catholic
While the more left-leaning British media thrill to the news that Nick Clegg, new leader of the Liberal Democrats, does not believe in God, tonnes of ink is being spilled over Tony Blair’s conversion to Catholicism. And that’s not all. If you buy the Sunday Telegraph (UK) this week only, you’ll learn that Britain itself […]
Posted inLifestyle
Santa Claus gone bye-bye now
Shopping, any kind of shopping, at this time of year is like taking a course in suicide bombing for beginners, or how to make your own nuclear device with household detergents. There’s a fair probability you might get injured. After two hours of futilely looking for two very run-o’-the-mill power-tool accessories, I grabbed copies of […]