thecages

As of Monday (S1-day) my commute changes.

I'll be trading in this

for this

I'm actually looking forward to this - it'll be nice to shed some baggage.
Also, on my new route I only cross one robot and the entire trip takes about 10 minutes (door-to-door) as opposed to the current 20-45 minutes (depending on traffic).

Trivia: I've had this bike since university which makes me feel a bit like Anita's dad who holds onto stuff and claims that it's still 'functions perfectly'[1] regardless of how old and ratty it is.

[1] He's crazy and we love him for it :)

Two more days in the SAP project office, two more...

Here's another hilarity.

We share a floor with the CTI Claremont campus(and I use the term campus loosely) which means that we share loos with a bunch of 18-22 year-olds who've chosen to launch themselves into the career world via a quality education from a private institution[1].
For some months now these shared loos have been really gross, stinky urinals, paper-towel balls dumped all over the place and a general 24-hour party vibe in the stalls. Fuck, what can you do? The kids do need someplace to hang out.

So what the building management decided to do a couple of weeks ago is to lock the toilets and to only dish out keys to the adults.

This means that if you now want to go for a pee(or heaven forbid something more serious) you have to first swing by the receptionist, hope that there is a key in the little box and then head over to the sanctuary of the john.

There's a snag though. The lock on the gents is wonky which means that only some of the keys (some of the time) will unlock it. This means that even if you've managed to secure a key you're still not guaranteed of relief.

The situation has deteriorated beyond ridiculous to the point where people are scheduling their biology to coincide with their lunch/smoke/vent breaks to be able to use another facility in one of the nearby malls.

This morning someone stuck the below up next to the watercooler.
I'm positively glowing at the prospect of moving to a sane office environment.



Also, windows died spectacularly the other day - not even Task Manager survived and I eventually had to hard-reset the infernal device by holding down the power switch until the BIOS relented.

[1] I have no beef with non-fancy university/tech training companies (I worked for one and did a project management diploma through another). But I've spent the last year or so sharing lifts with kids who honestly couldn't be bothered to do more than the bare minimum of what is required for them to get an invite to the graduation booze-up[2].
 [2] Of course not all CTI students are bling-obsessed, gum-chewing,
 phone-posing losers[3], but this joint does seem to attract a high
 percentage of them.
   [3] And the CTI marketing material certainly doesn't discourage
   this type of world-view[4].
     [4] Boy, am I grumpy right now[5].
         [5] Blame it on the Flu[6].
             [6] Just my luck with only two days to go.

I've been cleaning up the accounts that I have scattered on various Unix/Linux systems all over the place, backing up files, deleting history(!), changing passwords to something innocuous.

I've for a while now been thinking of blogging my discarded passwords, but am worried that I still have some accounts on long-forgotten sites that use those.

I tend use two passwords at a time, a general-purpose password for everyday use and a root password.
The root password that I'm currently using is _very_ strong so I'll probably keep it a while still.
But I'll retire my current general-purpose password when I start at S1.

Here's a sample of some of the old old passwords that I've used[1]

         nitapyke       (the classic general purpose, certainly not used anymore)
        naturalreality (root I used at Prism)
        g0crazy        (general purpose)
        carnival       (varsity-era)

Also, this is really funny http://www.themcpassion.com

[1] oh well, if some of these still exist I deserve to have those accounts hijacked.

I've been trying to make sense of the variety of movements, schools and -isms that label themselves anarchous or are pulled out of someone's hat when talking about anarchy.

Here's a schematic of my round-up so far
It all starts with anarquismo sin adjetives

First hearing Amon Tobin (Permutations) was a life changing event for me.
It was at a time when I was learning to relax a lot more and to just go around digging strange new things, and hey presto! there it was - the most futurist audio assault on the planet.


I spent a few years bravely following Amon Tobin's progress but lost touch with him around the release of Supermodified - when I really started getting into techno.

About a year or so ago I got a hold of the Solid Steel Presents live album which totally rocked, but I somehow kinda figured that he was just blessed with an ear for radical music made by others and that he was still headed down the downtempo road that Supermodified suggested.

Boy was I wrong.

I've had his last album (Out From Out Where) for some months now (sigh, yes on mp3) but never really took the trouble to listen to it apart from the single (Verbal).


So I eventually transferred it to my PED(Personal Entertainment Device for all you trend-spotters) a few days ago and yowza! was promptly blown away.
It's plainly fucking ridiculously fast - it is of the future.

All I can say about tracks like Back from Space, Rosies and especially Triple Science is fuck fuck fuck fuck.
fuck.

Every now and again The Register spits out a gem like this one.

At long last, Sun Microsystems will fire up its retail grid computing service and give any US customer access to a supercomputer class system.

Casual Sun observers will be scratching their heads right about now, believing that Sun had already announced such a service a long time ago. That's correct.

Sun first "launched" its $1 per CPU hour plan in September 2004. [Their] plans revolved around the idea that any company could pop onto a web site, enter a credit card number and then access as many CPUs as they needed.

Sun has spent the last 18 months trying to make this happen. First, it battled the basic logistics behind creating a massive publicly accessible cluster, then it battled the government. Regulators didn't care for the idea that rogue nations could log on to the Sun cluster and design nuclear weapons or run dirty bomb simulations in their spare time.

It seems unlikely that an Axis of Evil member would want to leave such an obvious trail of their activities, including their Visa account, in the hands of Sun and its three-letter friends. But, hey, everyone likes frequent flier miles.

Sun has managed to assuage the government's fears by making the initial Sun grid a US thang only.

So by limiting access to nuke-type computing power to Southern Rednecks like Timbo McVeigh everything will be hunky dory - phew!

I've recently discovered The Word at one of those remaindered magazine stores.
I love its tagline: 'At last! Something to read!' which is exactly how I feel about it (great cover CDs as well).

From the December 2005 issue - an interview with Sharon Osborne.
Se comes across as a really intelligent and funny person who just happens to not care what anyone else thinks of her. very cool.
Here's a snippet of the interview (be sure to catch the last Q&A about Madonna - yowza).

Note: there's some seriously nasty language ahead.

Mostly she's considerably more measured than the effusive curser we've seeen on TV until, suddenly, a subject ignites an outburst and Tourettes, momentarily, takes over.

You were born to a famous man, married a famous rock star, had childern who became famous and now you're more famous than any of them. There must have been an impact on those relationships.
It has changed the relationships, but really there's just less time together.
[...] It's changed the way I conduct myself in business 'cos I can't do certain things any more because it wouldn't look good!


...[So] there's no more kicking promoters in the bollocks and biking round boxes of human faeces. You have to reign yourself in.
I do. Those days are over! And it was a little hobby of mine.

So your version of reigning it in is sabotaging Iron Maiden's sound at Ozzfest this summer?
Fuck 'em, they deserved it. He deserved it. Having a go at my husband every night. (Bruce Dickinson made onstage remarks about not needing a reality show to give him credibility.)
He has a huge ching on his shoulder. Because he hs no celebrity. I just thought, you're taking the piss, mate, 20 shows, earning 185 grand a night and you're taking the piss out of my husband and our hospitality? You prick.
You can say what you want about me, you pick on my family then [...] I will eat you up.
I love people. I treat people the way I like to be treated, but if I don't get that back then (snaps fingers), next! You play, you pay. That's the way I look at life.

A lot of the rock aristocracy have been pretty strict with their kids: Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney, Bob Geldof. Madonna doesn't even allow television, apparently.
Oh that's fucking ridiculous, crap, fuck off, what a load of bollocks!
And writing those painfully silly books and reading them to your kids. If my mum came to me with a book like that I'd say, "Fucking stick it up your arse."
Fucking English Roses, bollocks. It's like dressing up with her. One day you're in fucking gun gear, then you're in horsing gear, then you dress like a fucking dyke, then you dress like a hooker, then you're in a flowery dress reading kids' poetry looking like a fucking librarian, then you're back looking like an old hooker again.
For fuck's sake, who are you? Who are you? At that age, you should know who you are, what bloody religion you are and what you represent.
Can you imagine all the effort that goes into that? You cannot be all things to everyone and be true to yourself, I'm sorry, I don't care who you are.
You can't one day be in Horse and Hound and the next in Dyke Weekly.
Otherwise, you're just pleasing, pleasing and being something you're not. Nobody is everything to everybody.
I didn't like bloody Mother Teresa. See? Somebody didn't like her. Ugly old cunt in sandals.

Fuck, I fucking _hate_ smarmy fucking politicians[1].
After some weeks of tug-of-war the DA (spitooie!) have managed to sneak their candidate (Helen Zille) into the mayoral lazyboy.

What really ticks me off is the way that she accepted the golden chain as featured on the front page of the Cape Times today.
It's like frickin' Eye of the Tiger was playing in the background or something.




[1] I've been listening to Billy Connolly in the car recently

also saw this great movie last w/end which I can recommend highly.

Not since (uhm, can't think of an example now) have I seen a film that bombards its viewers with such a wide range of Technicolor emotions.
It is at times hillarious, at times frightening - think Snatch meets Sexy Beast meets Requiem for a Dream.

The soundtrack is also grrrrreat.
Especially the Troubles(mp3 snippet) by the Beta Band.

Saw a really cool t-shirt on a tourist-type at the Waterfront this w/end.
It said:

Warning! some pretension[1] ahead - a pinch of salt is recommended

By way of introduction...
I've been interested in anarchism as a viable (and I hate to use the word here) philosophy for a while now.
And by philosophy I don't mean vague ramblings or a mish-mash of convenient ideas - I mean a simple, solid point of view which can inform my everyday life.

Maybe I should quickly mention the image that currently perches in the sidebar of this blog.
At the moment it's a collection of three symbols: anarchy, yin yang and the Gonzo logo.


At the moment these are important symbols to me as they represent the major ideas that currently inform my worldview.
They represent(in order) anarchy (surprise, surprise), balance and freedom.

I think I'll drop the last one first.
I totally support the spirit behind the Gonzo logo but I don't find it to be a crucial part of what I'm trying to understand.
In many ways anarchy in itself is strong enough to encapsulate the kind of personal freedom that Gonzo represents.

Also, there is a strong link between early Taoism (from which the concept of yin yang emerged) and anarchy and(at least in the Taoist tradition) the two concepts are supporting pillars of one another.

So, yes - out with the Gonzo(but with much respect for what it means) - continue simplifying.

[1]
Or perhaps self-awareness.
There seems to me to be a subtle difference between pretension and self-awareness.
But I'm not sure if that makes it any better.

I'm very lucky to have an ear for grammar and tenses.

I pick up languages very quickly (I've picked up slightly wonky conversational Portuguese in two visits to Brazil), mainly because I somehow seem to be able to hear when something sounds correct instinctively.
This is the case with Portuguese where I am very sure of whether I form a sentence correctly or not.
This does not, however, mean that if I know that I've done it incorrectly I also know what the correct form is - just that I seem to be able to recognise the correct form.

Along those lines I've also always been good at English(my second language) tenses.

Here's an example of a fun sentence.

If I wanted to swim I would have had to have brought my ducky wings.

What I've not ever been good at is describing the grammatical parts of such a sentence.

OK here we go, but first a disclaimer:

1. I don't know shit about formal grammar - I'm going to pull this sentence apart using just what I've been able to gleen from Google in the last half an hour.
2. I don't give a shit about formal grammar - please don't send me corrections :)

OK, now that that is out of the way:

First, my guess is that this is simply a complex (multi-clause) past perfect sentence.
It is certainly not past perfect progressive (That would be 'If I had wanted to be swimming...').

Next, The sentence has two clauses as follows:

If I wanted to swim | I would have had to have brought my ducky wings.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Clause           |       Clause

And finally, Let's look at these two clauses.
Here's a list of the abbreviations used below:

• C- Conditional
• L - Verb Link
• N - Noun
• NM - Noun Modifier
• P - Pronoun
• V - Verb
• MAV - Modal Auxiliary Verb

If | I | wanted | to swim |
-----------------------------
C | P |   V    |   V     |

I | would have | had | to | have | brought | my | ducky | wings |
-------------------------------------------------------------------
P |     MAV    |  PP | L  |   V   |   V    | P  |  NM   |   N   |

---

There's also a cool toy at Link Grammar which spits out this:

+-----------------------------------------------Xp-----------------
+---------------Wd---------------+                         
|      +-----------CO*s----------+                         
|      +Cs+-Sp*i-+--TO-+--I-+    +-Sp*i+---If--+-PPf-+-TO-+-If-+---
|      |  |      |     |    |    |     |       |     |    |    |
LEFT-WALL if I.p wanted.v to swim.v I.p would.v have.v had.v to have.v


-----------------------------+
+---------Op--------+    |
|      +-----Dmc----+    |
PP--+      |    +---AN--+    |
|      |    |       |    |
brought.v my ducky.n wings.n .

Constituent tree:

(S (SBAR If
 (S (NP I)
    (VP wanted
        (S (VP to
               (VP swim))))))
(S (NP I)
(VP would
  (VP have
      (VP had
          (S (VP to
                 (VP have
                     (VP brought
                         (NP my ducky wings)))))))))
.)

My High School English teacher would be proud!

My sister gave me a really great book for my birthday recently.

One of the reasons I love e2 is that the creators[1] of the site feel such a strong personal ownership of their system.



[1] btw. Nate is also the uber-geek who built most of /.

So there it is - I've accepted S1's offer.

It seems strange that the decision was so difficult to make.
On paper it's clearly the right thing to do, but somehow I wasn't prepared for how much of my ego and self-esteem is tied up in my current status (the reputation, the authority - the car).
Having to now prove myself all over again, to gain respect and trust with a new group of people has left me feeling very exposed and fragile.
But the more distance I get from the decision (even just a few hours) the more I can feel that I'll be OK and that I now have a new, higher mountain to climb.

blah blah whatever.

I accompanied Anita to the Design Indaba last weekend. yawn[1].

They had a fashion ramp show every fifteen minutes or so. yawn.
Had a good time watching the people watching the show, though.
Especially the ones in the front row quietly speaking a running-commentary to themselves.

^whisper 'oh my god, that slit is just too high, oh edgy' ^whisper

[1] I must qualify this by saying that I'd go to just about anything with Anita if she really wants to (except shoe shopping[2]) - I'm happy when she's happy[3].

[2] We managed to settle that one some years ago.

[3] That is, as soon as I have a fucking cup of proper fucking coffee in my hand.

What am I doing at work all of a sudden on a public holiday - yanked out of a lunch with a friend with no forewarning. no fucking planning.

So, I have an offer from S1 Corporation (formerly Mosaic). Harcore shop. The most difficult interviewing process I've ever been through (close to 7 hours in total).

So, courtesy of i-resign.com