Is life in America like it is in the movies?

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Posted on 25 August 2006 South Africa

Watching DVD’s, movies, mini-series and sitcoms that come out of Hollywood always has my subconscious thinking about what life in America must be like. Is it really like it is in the movies?

There are always small parts in movies that everyone can spot is completely far fetched, like the touch-of-a-button, do absolutely everything without you actually doing anything, super-computer. But what about the subtle things that are in almost every movie….

Do kids in high-school, prep-school whatever you want to call it school, all drive on those yellow magic school buses? Also, does every college student have a car? And especially, does the college *insert American accent* “quarter-back” have 3 best friends that always drive in a convertible sports car or jeep together?

Does every postbox have one of those flags that goes up or down if there is mail inside? By the way, how the hell do those things actually work?

What about all the sports betting? Do all middle aged american men bet every single week on their favourite football, ice hockey or basketball team?

What about when its the end of the school day, does every single class in school / college have a clock on the wall above the chalkboard that is perfectly synchronised with the bell?

Enough about school, what about every morning, the folks that walk to work, do they always stop at Starbucks and know exactly what coffee they are about to order? “Can I have 1 Tall Cafe Grande Decaf, low-fat milk, foam, 2 sugars. Make it quick, I’m late for work.”

Does every bell boy at every hotel / block of flats wear a maroon suit with one of those square hats?

Lets not get onto cab drivers. Every single one of them have a photo of their family on the dashboard, and a sandwich on the seat next to them. They also all seem to be South Americans!

Mom’s always make flapjacks or pancakes for breakfast, and theres always enough time for the entire family to sit down at the table and order their breakfast, except either Dad or college teenager is late and has to grab a slice of toast and run. What about those huge bottles of milk? Do you even get 5 litre milk bottles anywhere else in the world?

I could go on forever, but are Americans really like that? Or are all these situations I’ve just mentioned, “only in the movies…”. Could I be that short-sighted?

Linux almost saved my day

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Posted on 21 August 2006 Personal

Last week Tuesday, my pride and joy, decided to stop booting, and nothing i did helped. I couldn’t get into Safe Mode, and worst of all the fail-safe method of booting the Windows CD and “repairing” Windows didn’t work. It would boot, load the drivers, and just before the format or install Windows menu appears, the PC just hangs.

Worst of all, I had got pretty complacent about doing backups, and because of that, I had files on this laptop that I had nowhere else. :-(

Linux to the rescue

What to do? Defza came to my rescue and gave me a Live Linux CD. ( For those less informed, its Linux that runs of a CD, straight out the box. No installation needed.) So here I was, a Windows user, quickly learning Bash syntax, mounting and unmounting USB flash drives, and copying all the files I forgot to backup off the laptop and onto another PC.

I lost 2 days because of this laptop, and we still don’t know what is wrong. I formatted the hard drive from Linux, and the Windows CD still didn’t give me that menu I was oh-so-wanting to see for 2 days. So I started up the extra laptop that we had ordered, and made it my own. The non-booting Windows laptop is off to the supplier to find out what went wrong. So after all my struggles, it looks like some sort of hardware issue. :-( The only good thing that came from this is I learnt some very valuable lessons.

So here are my 4 tips on how to get your PC up and running again in next to no time after experiencing software or hardware failure.

  1. Backup your crucial files! Use a product like Beyond Compare that will backup all your files off to another networked PC. Backup your emails, critical work docs and all development files daily. It literally takes seconds to do this type of backup, but do you think we do them regularly enough? (Backing up to CD everyday, takes way to long. So hiving your files off to another PC everyday, and doing DVD backups once a month, saves you alot of time and effort.)
  2. Have a Windows CD, Linux CD or a Recovery CD handy at all times. You never know when your PC will crash and you are going to need to recover something off it using some sort of Live CD.
  3. Hardware backups. This is an expensive option, but having a PC that you are able to turn to when your main machine dies, is sometimes crucial. You might just as well take a weeks holiday while you wait for your only PC to be repaired at your supplier.
  4. Have a smart friend proficient in talking the language of PC, only a phone call away. You might think you know everything, but when the pressure is on, you might not be thinking of the most simple thing that might fix your problem.

So there you have it. I’m happy to report that I’m backup again, pun intended.

Chelsea – Really a new look team?

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Posted on 9 August 2006 Sport

It’s no secret I’m a Chelsea fan and I’ve been one since 2000. Those were the days when Ruud Gullit was player / coach, Dennis Wise wore the captains armband and Chelsea had tons of non-English players in their squad. Well, not much as changed about that stat, but the quality of English players in the team has definitely increased.

What has changed at Chelsea?

Firstly, they’ve changed kit sponsors. No longer does Umbro don their shirts, but the famous 3 stripes of Adidas, and I’m for one very pleased. Just take a look at the World Cup kit sponsors and have a look at the quality teams sponsored by Adidias, and scroll further down and see that only England and Sweden are sponsored by Umbro. Doesn’t that some something?

Secondly, their squad. They’ve sold a couple of players, and bought a couple of players, but I think the most important factor is that their defence has stayed pretty much the same. Have a look at the previous winners of the Premier League, and most of the teams that have won have done so by letting in the fewest goals. They have lost Del Horno in defence, but if they could replace him with Ashley Cole from Arsenal, well their defence will look even more rock solid. Terry, Carvalho, Gallas, Ferriera, Bridge, Geremi and most importantly Cech and Cudicini, currently make up their defence, which conceded the fewest goals in the Premiership last season.

In the midfield and upfront, They’ve lost Gudjohnsen, Duff and Crespo. But Ballack and Shevchenko will be welcome changes to their squad. I also think Essien might have a really awesome season for Chelsea, as he has gone through and is starting to adapt to the English playing style, and judging by his World Cup, seems ready to show why he is considered one of the best players to come out of Africa.

The one thing that people have been saying is “this is a new look Chelsea”. Since when? Chelsea’s play focuses around a couple of core players – Lampard, Makelele, Cole and Terry. They playing style is also dominated by these players and that certainly won’t change this season. We will just have to see which other players will shine, and bring some of their unique flair to Chelsea and to the English game.

In

  • Andriy Shevchenko (Milan)
  • Michael Ballack (Bayern Munich)
  • Salomon Kalou (Feyenoord)
  • John Obi Mikel (Lyn Oslo).
  • Hilario (Nacional)

Out

  • Carlton Cole (West Ham)
  • Eidur Gudjohnsen (Barcelona)
  • Jiri Jarosik (Celtic)
  • Glen Johnson (Portsmouth, loan)
  • Damien Duff (Everton)
  • Hernan Crespo (Inter Milan, loan)
  • Asier del Horno (Valencia)

Just one last thing, have a look at Man United. Either Alex Ferguson thinks that his 1 signing in Michaek Carrick is going to make all the difference and turn United around this season, or they have completely lost the plot. With players like Ruud van Nistelrooy, Gerard Pique, Quinton Fortune and Tim Howard leaving, do they really think their other players are going to fill the gaps? Heres to a United struggling to stay in the top 4 in England.

Offline blogging

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Posted on 6 August 2006 Marketing Personal Sushi blogging

After my first failed attempt to blog offline using ecto, I’m now trying Zoundry. So if you actually get to read this, you’ll know it works. :-)

There hasn’t been much happening on my blog of late. Exactly 1 post in July, can you believe. But I’m almost sure that if I can get this offline blogging thing to work, you’ll definitely be hearing more of me. Anyway, heres what’s been cooking…

Sushi

mac-knife.jpgAfter borrowing a sushi chef’s knife on my birthday to make sushi, I just had to get my own. I really love sushi, and being able to make it myself at home, is awesome. The only problem making sushi at home is finding fish at a decent price. Salmon retails for around R200/kg at Woolworths as well as at the local sushi restaurant around the corner. So if anyone knows where I could get salmon a little cheaper in Cape Town, please let me know. Heres a pic of my dinner plate from my birthday. (I made it all myself!)
my first attempt at making sushi

Work

David, who gave me my first “big break” has taken up the position of CEO of one of our divisions, which meant he had to move Namibia. David is one of the most awesome people you could meet, and he has taught me so much about programming, business and life. We surely going to miss him in our office. We will still be working with David, but the distance will always feel like he has gone.

But there is always a bright side. Especially when a theres a ring at the gate, and a courier comes to drop off a couple of laptops, 19″ LCD’s, leather bags and a multi-function laser printer. These laptops absolutely fly. It’s heart is a Centrino duo which beats at 1.8GHz, biceps the size of 2GB, and a stomach able to hold 120GB. And when you hook it up to one of those LCD’s, there really is tons of desktop space to go around. No need for multiple desktops, ala Linux styles.

Life

My 2 Virgin credit cardsAs you might know, I recently received my Virgin credit card, but they sent me the wrong one. (The one on the right.) So I gave them a call and in a week, they sent me my Bling. I have heard of people complaining about the service and delays in receiving cards, but the benefits will pay off in the long run. Give them a chance to find their feet. As they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither are all the hiccups ironed out when launching a nationwide business in South Africa. Hey, I can’t complain about getting 5% interest on any spare cash I have lying in it. ;-)

So, even though I don’t have a decent connection at home, at least being able to watch TV and blog like this is pretty cool. When I get to work in the morning, all I’ll do is hit the synchronise button, and this post goes live! No need to sit at home on a dial-up and hope and pray I don’t get dropped half way through this sentence. Cheers.

Offline blogging with ecto sucks!

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Posted on 4 August 2006 Personal blogging

I had this whole post written in ecto last night, offline I might add, and this morning, when I opened ecto up to upload the post, it refreshed my posts from my blog, but had canned my post from last night! Does anyone know of a decent offline blogging editor, that actually works?

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