Getting used to Stellenbosch again…

• Monday, a 7:00 walk around Stellenbosch, first day in the new Stellenbosch office, house viewing in Stellenbosch.
• Funny, this is the same Stellenbosch building where I worked in my very first job.

• “once again, I find myself with my friends.”

• Interesting read about honest blogging : “My own personal motto is: honesty to a point. I will never harm anyone.”
• One thing I’m not going to be miss from staying in Somerset West: the pets.
• Tuesday, had to de-tangle Mia’s hair after she washed it with soap, Stellenbosch meeting, day at the office, glass of wine with Andrew.

• “Who needs a grumpy girlfriend?” — Andrew

• Charl wrote about TrustFabric’s next phase.

• “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” – Wayne Gretzky

• Wednesday, day at the office, visit to Piet’s house on the way back home.
• Had about 6 cups of coffee this week, coffee machine in the office, I remember why I stopped drinking coffee in 2001.
• MTU issues with the VPN, very annoying not having root on the office routers.

• “Jesus Christ Super Spar” — Anton, about the Spar

• Thursday, day at the office, Gavin moved into the office, I’m a sucker for healthy buffet lunches, visited the mountain bike shop, drove to Cape Town, burger at Da Vinci’s with Georg, gin and dry lemon at Carlyle’s with Milton, White Russian at Daddy Longlegs – I stayed in the Far Away from home room.
• Friday, woke up in Long Street, fresh chili juice and omellette on the red sofa, gym, wheel alignment, car wash, fetched Deadmau5 tickets, Sentient party at Jason’s Bakery on Bree, sundowners at the Radisson with Aiden, Chris and Georg, Fight Night at The Armoury Boxing Club with Cath and Nechama, La Bottega, The Power and the Glory.
• I definitely become less of a nice person if I don’t get enough exercise.
• Saturday, drove through to SSW for Stage Coach, lunch at Cafe Zest, a walk around Radloff park, probably the first time I had take away sushi, photo processing.

• “Crab sticks – the polony of the sea.” — Georg

• A year ago getting 20 photos was easy, now I have to work fairly hard to get 20 photos I’m happy with.
• Sunday, Blaauwklippen Family Market – Gerald let Mia sing Shosholoza, nap, Blues Broers at the Helderberg Nature reserve with Andrew and Gavin, pizza.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

If you ever need a quick temporary ADSL account…

I got to the office today and the fibre line is down. No problem – let’s just reset the ADSL router in the corner, cool – it syncs – now I just need an ADSL account. Easy.

I phone up Web Africa. I explain it’s an emergency and I probably only need the account for the day – but I have no internet access.

Abigail sells me a 2GB pre-paid account by credit card. Cool.

She ask me to check my email for account details. Nope, can’t do that – no internet remember. Ok, I get put through to support.

Darryl tells me to find the account details by logging into their client portal – nope, can’t do that – no internet, he sends me an SMS with the account details. I try those – nope – can’t get an IP – I figure out that he SMS’d me details to their client portal – and NOT the ADSL login details I asked for.

I phone support again. Darryl reads me the ADSL login details. It connects this time but I get a page which asks me to top-up my account? Then he tells me that they’ve been having a problem with their top-up system today and I can only use the account “later” – it’s a “minor thing” which they are working on.

All I wanted was an ADSL account for the day which would work as soon as I paid.

RSAWeb worked out way better. One call which ended with working account details in the router. I needed to talk to only one person and I got 3GB of traffic at less than what I paid for the 2GB Web Africa traffic.

UPDATE 12:05

Got a call from RSAWeb to check if everything is working. Nice.

UPDATE – the next day at 13:30

The Web Africa top-brass sent me an email and added some extra traffic to my account (thanks). They seem keen to improve the customer experience for the case above.

UPDATE – Dec 5 11:25

I get a text message saying RSAWeb is billing me R158.00 – which I can only assume is them mistakenly signing me up to some form of recurring service. *sigh*

A low carb week..

• Monday, woke up in Tamboerskloof, 2nd day at gym in about 6 weeks, freshly squeezed juice with chili at Oona’s, admin and work, dentist, Waterfront – got earphones for my iPod, meeting in Tamboerskloof, tea at Neo, a beer with Andrew, Aiden and Cams at Sotano, drinks with Georg and Anton.

• “Sounds like you need a seven seater car and a good babysitter.” — Aiden.

• Tuesday, fetched Mia from school, took Mia to gymnastics, a walk around Lourensford with Mia and Francis, made supper, slept like a baby.
• I don’t think anybody is designed to be a single parent of three children.
• Wednesday, found a copy of the Eikestad nuus, two meetings in Stellenbosch, dentist, gym, cable car contour road walk, Glen Beach visit, bought a fair bit of yoghurt, supper at Sgt Peppers in Long Street with Parri.
• I think I’m starting to feel at home in Stellenbosch again – I now have MFM pre-programmed on my car radio again.
• Thursday, early dentist mini-op under conscious sedation – lost about 20min of time – pretty impressive sedation process, Andrew fetched me from the dentist, nap, yoghurt for brunch and lunch and a protein shake for supper.
• Friday, checked out the new office in Stellenbosch, house hunting day, Radloff Park walk with Mia and Francis.
• Saturday, took Mia to a Stage Coach class and played photographer, nap, Jordan Wine Estate Summer Festival with Kloppies, Liezl and family, a sunset swim with Mia.
• Four of my photos made it into Mia’s school’s weekly newsletter.
• Sunday, rainy morning, the weekly photo processing session now involves getting photos off 4 cameras, Mia and I went for fish and chips at Trawlers in Gordon’s Bay and some soft server ice cream, a beer with Andrew and Shawn at OBT.
• Andrew became a home owner this week.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

Some recovered toys…

• Joy, I’m up to date with the weekly blog posts again.
• Monday, woke up in Somerset West, fetched some recovered stolen things from the police in Camps Bay, meeting in Tamboerskoof, MIH Media Lab visit, a burger at the Big Easy in Stellenbosch.
• Seems the thieves who broke into the Bakoven house were two 14yo kids living in Camps Bay.
• First rule of changing the world: hang out with people who want to change the world – and always be ready to start from scratch.
• Tuesday, brunch with Cubby, fetched Mia from school, Inbox zero day.
• Wednesday, updated my two recovered iPods to iOS5, brunch with Cubby, fetched Mia from school, admin and work.
• I gave my (recovered) Canon DS10 camera to Mia – nice camera for kids.
• I’m tempted to install Ubuntu on my recovered Macbook Pro 5.5. Maybe next week. Preparing for the move away from OSX.
• Thrive: To do well what you are best at.
• Restore the symmetry of knowledge.

• “Where is the tiny iPad?” — Francis about the iPod Touch

• Thursday, lawyer meeting in Cape Town, red sofa, ISPA presentation at MTN Business in Century City, gym, met Andrew at Kirsty’s office launch function, Dias Tavern, a drink at Shack, &Union with Cath.

• “I’m a firm believer in the idea that people can change.” — Andrew

• Good read on Anonymous
• Friday, woke up in Tamboerskloof, TrustFabric presentation for a delegation of French tech journalists and analysts, lunch at Hemelhuijs with some Springfield Chardonnay – yum, nap, a beer at Rafiki’s with Georg, burger at Mason’s, Carlyles.
• Saturday, Belle’s 9th Birthday party at the strawberry farm with Mia and Francis, we watched the Smurfs 3D movie – Francis’s first big screen movie, early supper and photo processing.
• I’m becoming a pretty experienced children’s party photographer.
• Sunday, rainy morning, lazy family day, watched Wild Stallion with Mia and Francis – while writing this post, Mia took her first outdoor swim for the season, a glass of wine with Anton at Andrew’s house, back to Cape Town.

• “Age wrinkles the body, quitting wrinkles the soul.” — from a calendar

• When you are ~homeless for a few weeks you figure out how important your basic little daily routines are.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

Starting the next chapter…

• This is for the week of 31 Oct to 6 Nov.
• Monday, woke up in Somerset West, house shopping, mostly spent time with Mia and my mom.
• Maximise your luck absorption area.
• Tuesday, meetings in Stellenbosch, fetched Mia from school, gymnastics visit, a sunset walk.
• Wednesday, lawyer meeting, admin and reading on the red sofa, haircut at Bianca’s, tea at Neo, a beer at The Power and the Glory and a burger at Da Vinci’s with Georg.
• Thursday, dinner with Will.
• Friday, two meetings in Stellenbosch, fetched Mia from school.
• Saturday, school “Fun day”.
• Sunday, Halloween birthday party.
• Marlyn started crawling.
• Summary of London startup scene: seems to be growing in momentum, but the weather still sucks.

Have a fun week, dot com kids.

Article from Brainstorm Magazine:

Istanbul and London..

• Yes, this post is pretty late: it’s for the week of 24-30 October.
• Monday, woke up in Istanbul, omelette and apple tea, a visit to the Grand Bazaar, evening boat trip along the Bosphorus – the bit of water between Europe and Asia.
• Tuesday, Jacques left for the airport at around 5am, Skype chat with MM, froze my nuts off on an open top bus ride across the Bosphorus bridge, an early supper followed by Rice Pudding at Pudding Shop, admin and packing.
• I really like Istanbul – and Turkey – nice mix of East and West. It has a lot going for it. Very much a success story of an evolving culture.
• Addiction is a terrible thing – Jacques smokes R2500 of cigarettes per month.
• Wednesday, got up at 4:30 SAST, early flight from Istanbul Ataturk to London Heathrow, Heathrow Express – the wifi sucked, sushi with Jacques, went to a pub in Chiswick with Jacques, Jeremy and Peter to talk startup ideas, we had the London version of the Doner Kebab for a late dinner.
• Finished The Upgrade – Paul Carr book on way to London, like Rum Diary, but more tech gonzo, you do kinda end up feeling sorry for him for about 5 seconds.
• Thursday, washing day, got Jacques some Laphroaig and Balvenie, travelled back to Cape Town – by bus, tube and plane.
• Pretty tired of travelling by now, been living out of a bag for 30 days.
• Friday, MM fetched me at the airport, TrustFabric meeting at Willoughby’s, fetched my car and took Warren his Turkey Starbucks mug, a glass of wine at Andrew’s house.
• Saturday, afternoon with my mom and Mia.
• Sunday, braai at Andrew’s house.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

Joe’s official SA Blog Awards 2011

And the winners are.. in no real order:

• Jonathan Endersby
• Dave Duarte
• Front To Back
• Geekrebel
• Hitting the wire
• Local Loop
• Many Possibilities
• Neverness
• The Story Tree
• Tyler Reed
• …and cpbotha.net – not grouped under ZA people, but of SA origin.

Ok, well.. this is really just the list of South African blogs I have in my feed reader and that’s all I really care about. See you all again next year.

ps. You can grab the OPML file if you like.

A week of diving in the Mediterranean and about 600 photos…

• I’m writing this on my last night in Istanbul. Awesome week. I read The Upgrade while getting a tan on a boat. Occasionally a sea turtle would pop up for air, we free dived, had Mediterranean food and drank Turkish tea.
• Monday, rainy day – good for traveling, taxi to Kas, found a hotel with wifi, walked to the harbour for some diving deal negotiations, yogurt kebabs, photo processing and underwater photography equipment check.
• Tuesday, 1st day of Scuba diving (photography), we dived two sites and had lunch on the boat: Neptune Reef and Pigeon Island, Jacques took a nap while I processed photos, Doner Kebabs for supper.
• Wednesday, diving day: Canyon and Oasis Reef, meze platter and Raki around town square, Skype chat with Mia, photo processing.
• I’m very happy to travel with only once lens: 16-35mm.
• Thursday, diving day: free dive at Heybeli Ada reef, free dive at the Dekota C47 followed by a scuba dive, Jacques went paragliding – I was the camera man – pretty sure the ride down by car was more scary than the flying, walked around Kas, meat balls and garlic yoghurt for supper, Skype chat with Mia, photo processing.
• Note to self: need to make (edit) a video of the free diving and paragliding.
• Seems I can still free dive to 20m fairly easily.
• I think I like Turkey more than Greece and Egypt.
• Two weeks away from home but in front of my laptop every day – wifi everywhere. Also doing well with keeping my photo processing up to date. With a bit of luck I’ll get back home with almost no backlog.
• Traveling with Jacques involves a lot of stories about global politics, financial markets and conspiracy theories. Some interesting theories.
• Friday, last day of diving, two free dives: Besmi Adasi and Pina Banko, sunset drinks with the Dutch girls we met on the boat, fish and chips by the harbour.
• Jacques (aka Jacques Cousteau) managed to get some form of sea urchin / hydroid / reef protein poison grass burn on his belly. He raided the (Istanbul) hotel medicine cabinet for some expired medicine. A few scary things under the sea.
• Saturday, slept till 9:00, 4 hour bus ride to Antalya, domestic flight to Istanbul (with Onur Air) – flew from Asia to Europe in 1 hour, crazy fast taxi ride, found a hotel with wifi – inexpensive and central, 20 Euro/n each, took a stroll around the Sultanahmet area for some night time photography.
• I realised I had been in Asia most of the week – my first time on the Asian continent.
• Internet access in Turkey sucks a bit. Maybe it’s just the two places we stayed at, but DNS seems to work only about 75% of the time – using opendns seems to fix this.
• Sunday, breakfast on the roof terrace, sight seeing day, Blue Mosque, Aya Sofya, carpets and leather jacket window shopping, got some presents – scarfs etc, apple tea and baklava, had fish for supper at Balikci Sabahattin – interesting, they seem to not want to show you the menu, a beer down the road and some photo processing.
• Istanbul is BIG – ~20mil people big.
• You have to love the fresh pomegranate juice stands all over the place.
• Pretty much a month without any real exercise – other than free diving. Need to get back in shape when I’m home.
• Normally I don’t accept FB friend requests from people who have power balance bracelets.
• I added a whole lot of travel photos to Facebook.
• I think Paul Carr is my new hero.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

A week in London town and a weekend in Oludeniz…

• Monday, woke up somewhere over North Africa, London Heathrow, navigated my way to Jacques work, Thai food with Adriana in Chelsea.
• Adriana figures the internet is our first taste of a post-scarcity world.
• Tuesday, Jacques made omelettes – he’s on a low carb diet, walked around Silicon Roundabout (Old Street circle), TechHub visit, Innovation Warehouse visit, a pint of Grolsch Blonde on the Tattershall Castle (on the Thames), a beer with Bje around Covent Garden, supper at the My Old Dutch Pancake House with a Fruli Strawberry beer.
• London photos 1st set
• Got my first USB 3.0 device – a little red USB hdd for backups.
• Not that impressed with London ADSL speeds this year. Pretty much the same in SA – from a few coffee shops and homes I visited. Used to be a big difference in the past.
• Wednesday, laundry and backups day, business Skype calls and working mostly, evening Skype chat with Mia, Chinese food with Jacques, installed OSX 10.7.2 and Aperture 3.2.
• Thursday, lunch at Innovation Warehouse, walked around Oxford Street and China Town, dinner with Jacques in Canary Wharf – Scottish Jazz restaurant.. Guinness, Haggis, Talisker and Scottish mineral water.
• New toys: New Kindle (for N), underwater housing for my Canon S95, extra camera battery and a 220 Lumen strobe light waterproof to 100m – mostly for scuba diving photography.
• London photos 2nd set
• Friday, taxi ride to Stansted with Jacques, EasyJet flight to Dalaman, taxi to Oludeniz (GMT+1 to GMT+3), Doner Kebab for supper.
• Started reading The Upgrade by Paul Carr – pretty much what I did, but only for a month and I did not sell all my stuff. A night in Turkey cost me R170 – with free wifi.
• Saturday, got up at 11:00, had breakfast and lunch on the same deck overlooking Oludeniz beach, sunset swim.
• Sunday, fish and chips, walked to Oludeniz beach / lagoon area, sunset boat ride and beach party – with food included for about R70.
• Jacques has this theory that sex drive is a good indicator of general health.
• I last charged my phone in SA – state of the art battery technology and an OS without multi-tasking.
• The next chapter should involve some scuba diving. Will try to keep publishing some travel photos.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

Living out of a bag for a week..

• I’m writing this from London. Yes, yes, the weekly updates are a bit boring lately. Hopefully I can give you a few travel photos and some interesting news soon.
• Monday, Greyton and Caledon Spa.
• Tuesday, two meetings in Stellenbosch.
• Wednesday, meeting in Stellenbosch, gym, spin, supper at Sidewalk Cafe with Georg.. they are running a 4 course 2nd birthday special which is pretty good.
• Thursday, woke up in Tamboerskloof, red sofa, gym, massage, beer with Andrew at Beleza, a beer at The Power and the Glory, Promenade walk, went to buy new slops at the Waterfront.. I seem to consistently walk my way through one pair per year.
• Friday, gym, nurse visit and VitB shot, dropped my car off at the Audi garage, got a lift with Andrew to Somerset West via the Muizenberg beach road.. nice drive, drove to Betty’s with the family, sunset beach walk, bath routine.
• Drink enough water every day.
• Saturday, family day in Bettys, early beach session, fish and chips in Kleinmond, I got a bit sunburnt, sunset beach walk.
• Sunday, watched the rugby in Bettys, relaxing day around the beach house, overnight flight to London.. watched Pirates of the Caribbean 4.. not too bad, watched Page One: Inside The New York Times ..pretty good.
• I’m off to London to check out the startup scene and spend some time with my cousin.. then off to Kas (Turkey) for some scuba diving and Istanbul for a bit of culture and photography.
• I figure it’s a good idea to visit at least one good dive spot per year.. while we still have dive spots to visit and air travel pricing is reasonable.
• If you are interested in the London tech hubs have a look at: Tech City, Innovation Warehouse, Silicon Fen and Silicon Roundabout.
• ps. You may have noticed that Mia’s mom has asked not to be mentioned in this blog anymore.

Have a fun week, crazy kids.

It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day..

• Monday, setup my new Nokia C3, gym – first personal trainer session, swim, red sofa, fetched some boxes for the move, Kauai, sunset walk to Clifton with Georg.
• Installed MXit on my C3.
• Tuesday, personal training session, red sofa, sunset walk to Clifton.
• Wednesday, a walk around Stellenbosch, dropped off some Mia toys, packing session, 2.5hour spinning session.

• “Nobody ever got fired for organising a braai.”

• Thursday, early packing session, put pretty much everything I have in storage, personal trainer session, UKTI meeting, last packing session, Thai Yellow Curry at Carlyle’s with Georg.
• Don’t do personal training and move a lot of boxes on the same day.
• Read about TrustFabric in the October Brainstorm mag.
• Friday, woke up at Cath’s house, gym, red sofa, watched the rugby at Van Hunks with Milton, some house admin, drove to Greyton with Mia and family.
• Saturday, family day in Greyton.
• Sunday, family day in Greyton.
• 4 days without twitter, facebook, email and phone calls.
• Adventure is good for us.

Have a fun week, dot com kids.