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The da Vinci code (book review)
Published on 2012-05-25 15:13:00
The Da Vinci Code by Dan BrownMy rating: 1 of 5 starsOne of the best-selling novels in recent times has been The da Vinci code by Dan Brown, and now the story has been made into a film.Not only has the novel sold very well, but it has also generated a number of lucrative spin-offs – there are more than 20 books that claim to interpret The da Vinci code. There was a court case in which the authors of some other books sued Dan Brown for stealing some of his ideas from their books. They lost thei [..] > read more
What is this thing called Klout?
Published on 2012-05-23 22:48:00
Several people invited me to look at a site called Klout, and so I did. I've been looking at it on and off for a month now, and trying to discover if it is of any use, and if so what it was useful for, and the answer, I believe, is "not much".Some of the ideas behind it are quite intriguing, but I think it misses out in the implementation.The stated aim is to show who influences you, and who you influence in social networks, mainly Twitter, and which topics you are most influential in, and to gi [..] > read more
A guest post on my blog?
Published on 2012-05-23 08:20:00
Today I have had three (apparently) different people sending me e-mails to follow-up on queries about whether I was interested having them write guest posts on my blog.I vaguely remember having a spate of queries to that effect about a month ago, and deleting them as spam or a scam. But now there is a follow-up.I find such requests bizzare.It is dead easy to start your own blog.You can do it in about 2 minutes right here on Blogger.So what puzzles me is why these people (or this person) wants to [..] > read more
Blind fury (book review)
Published on 2012-05-22 09:25:00
Blind Fury by Lynda La PlanteMy rating: 3 of 5 starsIf, in the field of crime novels, one distinguishes between sub-genres like whodunits and police procedurals, this book definitely falls into the latter category. Whodunits usually have lots of suspects, and the search is to find which one committed the crime. In this book, however, the emphasis is on how the police go about gathering evidence, first of all to charge, and then to convict a suspect.In this story a young woman is murdered, and he [..] > read more
Politicians' genitals: private or public parts?
Published on 2012-05-21 04:57:00
In the same week controversy has erupted in both Canada and South Africa over the depiction of the genitals of politicical leaders of those countries in works of art.In Canada 'Well hung' nude Harper painting sparks mixed reactions | Toronto SUN:A nude painting of Canada's prime minister has politicians and Tim Hortons employees cracking jokes, pundits crying foul and one federal department reportedly offering up cash.Titled Emperor Haute Couture, the portrait hanging in a Kingston, Ont., public [..] > read more
Old Blogger interface - a huge improvement
Published on 2012-05-20 10:58:00
Recently my Blogger dashboard switched from the old interface to the new one, which I've been struggling with for the last few weeks.Now someone has explained to me how you can get the old one back.If you have had the new and degraded Blogger dashboard foisted on you, you can (at least for the time being) get the old one back.There's a little cogwheel thingy up in the top righthand corner of the new and degraded Blogger dashboard.Click on it and among the options that are revealed is the option [..] > read more
Cosatu, the DA and the youth wage subsidy
Published on 2012-05-16 00:49:00
This week I lost a lot of respect for Cosatu.Cosatu (Congress of South African Trade Unions) objects to the idea of a youth wage subsidy. The DA (Democratic Alliance) supports it. A couple of months ago Cosatu refused to meet DA leaders to discuss it, so the DA leaders decide to march to Cosatu headquarters to to hand over a memorandum on the topic. Cosatu objected to this, and said that the DA should engage properly, and not march. Yet when the DA leaders did try to engage properly, Cosatu reje [..] > read more
|More dysfunctional e-mail - Gmail
Published on 2012-05-14 23:36:00
Is anyone else having problems with this annoying pop-up in Gmail?It covers several menu items, and half of it seems to be hidden behind the browser tool bar, so there is no way of knowing what it is about and apparently no way of getting rid of it except by saying "OK" to something that one does not understand. > read more
The loved one lives again
Published on 2012-05-04 09:38:00
Evelyn Waugh's 1940s send-up of the American funeral industry, The loved one seems to have taken on a new lease of life, and entered the digital era. There's a site you can join, called "My Send Off" where you can plan your own funeral. It doesn't say so, but I suspect that it is sponsored by the funeral industry (hat-tip to a tweet from BBC_WHYS). Why do you need a funeral for a proper send-off? Read all about it here mysendoff.com | Blog | Mourning-Avoidance: Why Everyone Deserves a Funeral Se [..] > read more
May Day odds and sods
Published on 2012-05-01 06:39:00
In the intervals in which the Internet was working I managed to pick up a few snippets from Facebook, Twitter and elsewhere, which seem worth recording in a more findable form.Someone posted this saying of Rebecca West on FacebookAfter battling for some time with an erratic Internet connection, and Blogger's new and improved and totally dysfunctional interface, I gave up and posted this on my Wordpress blog -- you can see it here: May Day odds and sods | Khanya. > read more
The death of conversation?
Published on 2012-04-27 07:26:00
In the last four days I've spent quite a lot of time writing a couple of blog posts on topics that I thought were important, here and here.As I usually do, I announced them on Twitter and Facebook.Nobody bothered to retweet them, nobody on Facebook bothered to even "like" them, much less click on the link and read them.In fact I doubt if Facebook even bothered to show them to my friends. Facebook, after all, is concerned to show us only the really important stuff, like "X sent you are request in [..] > read more
Computer translation
Published on 2012-04-25 21:48:00
Google has for some time offered an online translation service, and Microsoft's Bing offered a competing one, which is used on Facebook (guess why). > read more
What is Klout, and how well does it work?
Published on 2012-04-24 22:31:00
A few days ago I wrote on my other blog about some online software tools, among which was Klout, which I've been trying out Some online software tools | Khanya.Klout is a website that purports to tell you how much influence you have in social networks, and who you are most in contact with. First impressions were difficult to gauge, because I discovered that Klout takes a bit of time to get up to speed. It starts off by adding your Twitter followers (or is it followees) as "friends" or "influence [..] > read more
E-mail is becoming erratic and dysfunctional
Published on 2012-04-24 04:37:00
It looks as though spammers are beginning to succeed in making e-mail useless.Several people have told me recently that e-mail that I send to their Gmail addresses ends up in their spam box. That is something new. One of the things that I thought was good about Gmail in the past was that one never had to check the spam box, because there were so few false positives. But now it seems that one will have to look in the spam box for mail. And also, when sending mail to anyone with a Gmail address, a [..] > read more
Google revamps Blogger -- is it worth it?
Published on 2012-04-21 06:45:00
The last time Google revamped Blogger, it was dysfunctional for 6 months or more, and thousands of Blogger users packed it in and moved to Wordpress.I myself started a WordPress blog, and got ready to move completely if Blogger got any worse, but I kept this one open, and eventually Blogger was more or less fixed, and most of the stuff that was broken started working again. But my WordPress blog quickly passed this one in the number of readers, and still gets about twice as many readers a day as [..] > read more
US politics in a nutshell
Published on 2012-04-21 04:49:00
Someone posted this on Facebook, and for those living outside the USA it says it all. It tells you all you need to know about both main parties in the current US election, and the other parties don't stand a snowball's chance in hell of being elected anyway.Yes, I know it's simplistic, and it over-simplifies complex issues, but unless you're a professional political fundi, it tells you all you need to know. Hat-tip to Daniel Lieuwen, who shared it on Facebook. > read more
The seeds of time: book review
Published on 2012-04-20 21:03:00
The Seeds of Time by John WyndhamMy rating: 4 of 5 starsIn my youth I liked John Wyndham's science fiction stories, and when I picked this one off a dusty shelf to catalogue it on GoodReads, I decided to re-read it before putting it back. The seeds of time is a collection of short stories, and I had forgotten some of them, and had only vague memories of the rest, so it was almost like reading them for the first time. And I enjoyed them just as much as when I first read them some 40-50 years ago. [..] > read more
London's dystopian Olympics: criminal sanctions for violating the exclusivity of sponsors' brands - Boing Boing
Published on 2012-04-20 00:07:00
In 2010, when Southj Africa was hosting the soccer world cup, some Brit newspapers played up reports of crime in South Africa, and always put in the first paragraph that it was the host country for the World Cup. Perhaps it's time to retaliate.London's dystopian Olympics: criminal sanctions for violating the exclusivity of sponsors' brands - Boing Boing: As London ramps up for the 2012 Olympics, a dystopian regime of policing and censorship on behalf of the games' sponsors is coming online. A sp [..] > read more
Sammy going south: book review
Published on 2012-04-18 01:23:00
Sammy Going South by W.H. CanawayMy rating: 4 of 5 starsSammy Hartland is a 10-year-old English boy whose parents are killed in the bombing of Port Said in 1956. He knows he has an aunt in Durban, which he knows is somewhere south of Port Said, so he sets out to cross the continent to reach her. He crosses deserts and mountains and savannah, and meets many people, some of whom help him, while others simply try to exploit him for their own purposes.At one level this is an adventure-travel s [..] > read more
Look who's defending Western Christian Civilisation now!
Published on 2012-04-16 10:23:00
Back in the 1950s and 1960s the National Party government in South Africa kept passing more and more repressive laws, which it claimed were necessary to defend Western (or "White" -- the terms were interchangeable in Nat vocabulary) civilisation.What were they defending it against?The Communist menace, that's what.One of the first repressive laws they passed was the Suppression of Communism Act (Act 44 of 1950).The National Party in South Africa and the Communist Party in Russia fell from power [..] > read more
Some more books to cross off my list
Published on 2012-04-16 03:17:00
Today Good Reads sent me a list of recommended books, based on the books on my "Abandoned" shelf. Those are the books I found so boring that I never managed to finish them, so I take it that they are saying that I will find these books boring too, and if I see them in a book shop I must not be tempted to buy them.I don't think that's what their recommendations are intended for, but it is nevertheless probably quite useful, and could save a bit of money.According to this list, the books to avoid [..] > read more
Believing the lie: Book Review
Published on 2012-04-12 05:10:00
Believing the Lie. by Elizabeth George by Elizabeth GeorgeMy rating: 4 of 5 starsLike most of Elizabeth George's crime novels, this one has the usual cast of Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley, his partner Barbara Havers, and his friends Simon and Deborah St James. Lynley is asked to travel to Cumbria for a semi-official investigation of the death of Ian Cresswell, which had been ruled accidental by an inquest. Cresswell was accountant in the firm of his uncle, Bernard Fairclough, who had asked [..] > read more
The marvels of privatisation
Published on 2012-04-10 14:54:00
The really good thing about privatisation is that it provides more opportunities for income-generation, as this example shows - U.S. judges admit to jailing children for money | Reuters: (Reuters) - Two judges pleaded guilty on Thursday to accepting more than $2.6 million from a private youth detention center in Pennsylvania in return for giving hundreds of youths and teenagers long sentences.Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, [..] > read more
The day the Queen flew to Scotland for the grouse shooting
Published on 2012-04-07 01:01:00
The Day The Queen Flew To Scotland For The Grouse Shooting: A Document by Arthur WiseMy rating: 4 of 5 starsThere are some books that one reads and re-reads, others that one reads once and discards, and yet others that one re-reads once and reads again after many years. This book is one of the last category.Sometimes books re-read after a long period are slightly disappointing, not quite as good as one remembered them. Others are better than one remembered them. For me, Jane Austen's novels fall [..] > read more
Tolls: Cosatu cashes in | City Press
Published on 2012-04-04 04:09:00
I think that City Press are being more than a little disingenuous in this article, which appeared in last Sunday's edition, when they imply that Cosatu is being hypocritical by objecting to toll roads while benefiting by investments in a firm engaged in road construction.Tolls: Cosatu cashes in | City PressTrade union federation Cosatu, an outspoken critic of toll roads, secretly benefits from a construction company involved in building new highways.City Press can reveal that Cosatu’s investme [..] > read more
The Times Literary Supplement's 100 Most Influential Books Since the War
Published on 2012-04-04 00:17:00
Someone posted a link on Facebook to a list of the most influential books since the Second World War.The Times Literary Supplement's 100 Most Influential Books Since the WarI found it interesting to see how few I had read, yet I have probably seen the thought of many of them retailed by other writers. It doesn't say whether the influence was good or bad -- that's probably a "readerly" decision, as the postmodernists might say.The ones I have read are:Albert Camus: The OutsiderArthur Koestler: Da [..] > read more
War and peace
Published on 2012-04-03 02:38:00
h, and if you like the message, you can click in those little squares below to propagate it on Twitter I think this cartoon applies to a lot more places than Israel and Iran.An American president (I think one of the Roosevelts) once said that the secrecy of diplomacy was to "talk softly and carry a big stick." Now the politicians seem to shout loudly while brandishing their sticks.Oh, and if you like the message you can click on those little squares below to propagate it on Twitter or "like" it [..] > read more
The light at the end of the tunnel
Published on 2012-03-31 01:48:00
This picture has been doing the rounds on Facebook.Talk of "the light at the end of the tunnel" always reminds me of an American, Gerry Jud, whom I met about 40 years ago.I had recently been banned, which among other things confined me to the magisterial district of Durban, where I did not live and had no place to live, and I had no job and no income, and the ban prevented me from doing most of the kinds of work I was capable of doing, or even entering lots of places to look for a job (if you wa [..] > read more
Introducing: The Classics Club
Published on 2012-03-23 01:23:00
Here's an idea for people who love reading.The Classics Club is for bloggers who blog about books they have read, to make a list of 50 classic works they plan to read over the next five years, and to blog about them as they read them.I like to blog about books I have read, and usually do that by noting them here Goodreads | Stephen Hayes's bookshelf: currently-reading (showing 1-12 of 12) (sorted by: date added). Good Reads also makes provision for a list of books to read, and I suppose one coul [..] > read more
The wheels on the bus go round and round
Published on 2012-03-20 01:24:00
Apart from anything else, I hate travelling on buses with painted-over windows like this.Wildrose campaign bus raises eyebrows - CBC News: Alberta's Wildrose Party confirmed that the questionable placement of party Leader Danielle Smith's photo on the campaign bus will be changed.A photo went viral on Twitter Monday shortly after the party unveiled the bus during a pre-election event in Edmonton. > read more
St Patrick's Day
Published on 2012-03-17 01:32:00
It is said that St Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland, which is why there are now no native snakes there.There have been various explanations of this, and of how it was done. I rather like this one, hat-tip to Casher O'Neill.Here's another one, with a more scientific explanation: nourishing obscurity | St Patrick’s Day mood setter.On a more serious note, there's this:Saturday 17th March 2012* Tone 6 - Third Saturday of Great Lent* Memorial SaturdaySt Alexius the Man of God, in Rome (411)S [..] > read more
My love-hate relationship with my Android cell phone
Published on 2012-03-15 08:43:00
A few months ago I started getting notices that my cell phone was due for an "upgrade". I had "upgraded" it two years ago, found that it was in fact a downgrade (the camera on the new phone was completely useless), so I kept the old one, and gave the new one to my son, who didn't care whether the camera worked or not.This time I looked at what was on offer, and was after the one with the best camera specification. And the only one that fitted the bill was an HTC Cha Cha, which had, so it said, a [..] > read more
Modernity's Debased View of Woman's Equality
Published on 2012-03-13 04:36:00
Responding to a claim that the equality of the sexes was established by a technological advance, the invention of the contraceptive pill, The Pittsford Perennialist: Modernity's Debased View of Woman's Equality quotes St Gregory of Nyssa (4th century): The gracious gift of likeness to God was not given to a mere section of humanity, to one individual man; no, it is a perfection that finds its way in equal measure to every member of the human race. This is shown by the fact that all men possess â [..] > read more
Jack Kerouac's American journey (book review)
Published on 2012-03-11 23:53:00
Jack Kerouac's American Journey: The Real-Life Odyssey of On the Road by Paul MaherMy rating: 4 of 5 starsOn the road is not my favourite book by Jack Kerouac so I might not have bought this book if it had not been going cheap on a sale. I'm glad I did buy it, though, because I found it more interesting than On the road, and it explains how that book was written.I recently read Neal Cassady: the fast life of a beat hero (review here), and found several details in this book that threw more light [..] > read more
Two evils for the price of one: abortion and pro-lifers
Published on 2012-03-07 17:52:00
I think that wilful abortion is evil, and a violation of human rights. But there are times when I think pro-lifers are just as evil, especially when I come across things like this, found via a link on Facebook.The person who posted it on Facebook introduced the link by saying "The Obama administration rules that stock holdes aren't really owners and have no real say in the operation of the business they hold shares in."I was curious and had a look at the site.Obama agency rules Pepsi use of cell [..] > read more
Good question
Published on 2012-03-06 00:26:00
What is the difference between what the Syrian army did in Homs and what the U.S. military did in Fallujah? And why?What Happens in Homs ... LewRockwell.com Blog:What is the difference between what the Syrian army did in Homs and what the U.S. military did in Fallujah? And why?Hat-tip to The Pittsford Perennialist: The Syria Narrative.A good question.And it prompts another:How loud were the calls from "the international community" for military intervention to stop the US Army doing what it was d [..] > read more
Twenty years of Model C
Published on 2012-02-28 01:57:00
It is now twenty years since"Model C" was forced on formerly "white" schools in South Africa, and we still haven't heard the end of it.Two years later apartheid officially ended, democratic elections were held, and one would have thought that Model C schools, a last-ditch attempt to retain a vestige of apartheid in the former white schools, would have been swept into the dustbin of history, never to be heard of again.But instead we hear of them quite frequently, and people speak of "Model Cs" an [..] > read more
Toll roads "compromise" - the worst of all possible worlds
Published on 2012-02-23 03:27:00
Faced with calls from various groups, including Cosatu, representing trade unions, and Naamsa (the association of automobile manufacturers, which employs members of trade unions) and the Automobile Association to scrap toll roads in favour of a fuel levy to finance roads, the government has decided to adopt the worst features of both systems -- to continue tolls, but to subidise them by means of an increased fuel levy.That is the kind of compromise that gives "compromise" a bad name.It also repr [..] > read more
Book sales
Published on 2012-02-22 02:40:00
I went to the Exclusive Books summer sale yesterday, and came home with seven books for R231.00Bartlett, Rosamund Benn, Anna. 2007. Literary Russia: a guide. New York: Overlook Duckworth.Callow, Philip. 1998. Chekhov: the hidden ground. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee.Conradi, Peter J. 2010. Iris Murdoch, a writer at war: Letters & diaries 1938-46. London: Short.Conrad, Joseph. 2010. Heart of darkness. London: Collins Classics.Crystal, David. 2007. By hook or by crook: a journey in search of English. Lon [..] > read more
The South Africa blogosphere, unravelled
Published on 2012-02-18 02:15:00
Amatomu's slogan used to be "The South African blogosphere, sorted."Well, now it has become unsorted, because Amatomu no longer seems to work. To "unravel" means to pull a knitted garment apart so that all you have is separate strands of wool, and you can no longer see the pattern or shape of the garment, or even the garment itself. It has gone.And one by one the tools that I used to use to find interesting blogs have gone, or become unusable.The first to go was Technorati. It's still there, I t [..] > read more
Unisa refuses to communicate by e-mail
Published on 2012-02-14 06:50:00
The University of South Africa (Unisa) used to be the biggest distance-education university in the southern hemisphere, but don't expect to be able to communicate with them by e-mail.Unisa refuses to accept e-mail from Telkom SA, South Africa's biggest telecommunications serivce, and the one that most other ISPs ride piggy-back on.Back when Unisa first started offering tuition, in 1961 or thereabouts, there was no e-mail, and so it was a correspondence university and everything went by snail mai [..] > read more
Tales from Dystopia X: The banality of evil | Khanya
Published on 2012-02-13 04:55:00
It's my other blog's fifth blogiversary today, so I'm referring everyone to the story at Tales from Dystopia X: The banality of evil | Khanya:It's about bureaucratic machinations in a conspiracy to stop one sick old lady from receiving communion.It's one of a series of posts on memories from the apartheid era in South Africa. The other posts in the series are:Tales from Dystopia I: Epukululo LovawamboTales from Dystopia II: Enemies of the StateTales from Dystopia III: Theological education in a [..] > read more
Obscenity
Published on 2012-02-07 22:43:00
A new breed of South Africans is emerging, a new subculture, perhaps. It is composed of those who do not merely want to be rich, but who want be filthy, stinking rich; obscenely rich.One of the things that one often hears is that crime is caused by poverty. But that is not strictly true. Criminologists who have researched the matter report that in societies where people are very poor, there is often relatively little crime. What causes the crime rate to rise is the income gap between the rich an [..] > read more
Bonking zombie is back
Published on 2012-02-03 02:24:00
A few years ago I discovered that vampires were more than undead monsters that populated horror novels. There actually is a vampire sub-culture, with live human beings who enjoy drinking human blood.But I thought zombies were safely(?) in the realm of the undead, until I read this article BONKING ZOMBIE IS BACK! Residents live in fear after gogo is found dead in house of sex . . . | DailySun blog: Last year, sex in the house of the Veeplaas zombie led to a mother, gogo and little boy being taken [..] > read more
Seth's Blog: Solving problems (vs. identifying them)
Published on 2012-01-28 07:16:00
Someone pointed me to this blog post: Seth's Blog: Solving problems (vs. identifying them): Often, we're hesitant to identify a problem out of fear we can't solve it. Knowing that we have to live with something that we're unable to alter gives us a good reason to avoid verbalizing it--highlighting it just makes it worse.While this sort of denial might be okay for individuals (emphasis on might), it's a lousy approach for organizations of any size. That's because there are almost certainly resour [..] > read more
Book review: The selected works of T.S. Spivet
Published on 2012-01-25 06:19:00
Selected Works Of T.S. Spivet, The by Reif LarsenMy rating: 5 of 5 starsTecumseh Sparrow Spivet is a 12-year-old boy who lives on a ranch in Montana in the USA, close to the continental divide. He is obsessed with making maps of everything, and wants to map the entire world, or at least the whole of Montana. He lives with his rancher father, his entomologist mother, and his older sister Gracie, and their dog Verywell. He misses his younger brother Layton, who died a few months earlier.He receive [..] > read more
Seeking asylum: varying views from five continents
Published on 2012-01-24 05:33:00
Asylum seekers seem to keep on making news. In some places, like Australia, asylum seekers are regarded as criminals, and the media sometimes refer to "suspected asylum seekers", as though seeking asylum was a crime one could be suspected of committing.The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which has been signed by most countries, says: Article 14. (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of pros [..] > read more
Bees, wasps and hornets
Published on 2012-01-15 17:46:00
On the alt.usage.english newsgroup we've been having a discussion on bees, wasps and hornets, and it seems that the names of these insects vary a great deal from country to country.In my youth I used to be terrified of insects like the one in the picture on the right, which used to come buzzing into our classroom during morning lessons and distract us from anything our teachers were saying.When I was at Mountain Lodge School in Magaliesberg we used to call them "hornets", but I later heard they [..] > read more
The ANC centenary
Published on 2012-01-08 09:28:00
The African National Congress, which has ruled South Africa for nearly 18 years, is having a big bash in the Free State to celebrate its centenary.ANC parties in Bloemfontein | News24: An ANC centenary torch was lit at midnight in Bloemfontein on Saturday, while party leaders, members, heads of state and guests celebrated until early hours on Sunday.ANC president Jacob Zuma and Archbishop Desmond Tutu lit the torch at the Wesleyan Church in the company of various party elders including former Pr [..] > read more
The phony liberators
Published on 2011-07-03 02:13:00
When Hugo Chávez first became president of Venezuela in 1999, he seemed to be a champion of democracy, and in initial reforms he tried to introduce a more participatory style of democracy.But that didn't last, and when he publicly sided with politic > read more
The Poor Mouth: Vulture Funds Act made permanent
Published on 2011-06-27 00:14:00
The Poor Mouth: Vulture Funds Act made permanent: "It seems to have gathered little or no coverage at the time but it very leasing to see that The Debt Relief (Developing Countries) Act 2010 was made permanent last month.The main effect of the act wa > read more
The origins of Christmas
Published on 2011-06-23 00:40:00
I once had to mark a university assignment, set by someone else, on the origins of the celebration of Christ’s nativity. So I read all the literature that had been recommended to the students, and tried to follow it up. All I found was speculati > read more
Namibian turning point - forty years ago today
Published on 2011-06-21 07:15:00
Forty years ago today the World Court announced its judgement that South Africa's rule of Namibia was illegal. It happened, most appropriately, on the Winter Solstice. Until then the nights had been longer than the days and getting longer. But therea > read more
The stonecutter - book review
Published on 2011-06-17 13:36:00
The Stonecutter by Camilla LäckbergMy rating: 4 of 5 starsThe first thjing I noticed about this book was the sticker placed on the cover, presumabl;y by the booksellers, saying "If you like Jo Nesbo you'll love this." And the books by Jo Nesbo have > read more
The generation gap
Published on 2011-06-14 23:38:00
The other day I was at a seminar on The Mission-shaped Church, and I became aware of the generation gap.There were a couple of questions that baffled me.One was quite amusing, or rather the response was. A couple of people from Malawi spoke about Afr > read more
Whodunit or chicklit? I can't decide
Published on 2011-06-09 09:10:00
Cold to the Touch by Frances FyfieldMy rating: 2 of 5 starsI read this book. I find it difficult to say much more about it. It's crime fiction of a sort. The protagonist is a middle-aged courtesan who plays amateur detective, but Miss Marples or Herc > read more
The link between abortion and assisted suicide
Published on 2011-06-08 04:12:00
This blog post on abortion and assisted suicide set me thinking about the ways in which society likes to kill people, and the moment we get rid of one means, we tend to introduce others.Ordered Liberty: The link between abortion and assisted suicide: > read more
I never drove white voters away: Malema
Published on 2011-06-05 06:13:00
The Yanks have Sarah Palin; we have Julius Malema. I don't know which is worse. I know that there are political loose cannons in every country, but, as someone once said, the trouble with political jokes is that they get elected.I never drove white v > read more
I write like WHO?
Published on 2011-06-01 01:39:00
I think I've tried this before, but the previous time I tried it with text from my journal. This time I thought I would try it with some text from a novel. I write likeGeorge OrwellI Write Like by Mémoires, journal software. Analyze your writing!Tha > read more
Detective novels and moral relativism
Published on 2011-05-30 05:33:00
When is killing another person legitimate? What criteria do you use to decide? Does the fact that something is legal make it morally acceptable?This book raises these questions and more.Spoiler alert: if you have not read this book, and want to read > read more
The morality of the assassination of Osama bin Laden
Published on 2011-05-27 23:38:00
An Anglican bishop's thoughts on the assassination of Osama bin Laden.Bishop Alan’s Blog: Moral relativism is not enough...: It follows from this basic theology from page 1 of the Bible, that if I commit an act, like a lynching, that denies the ima > read more
Parents keep child’s gender under wraps - Yahoo! News
Published on 2011-05-27 22:58:00
If gender is the social construction of sex, isn't this child too young to have a gender yet?Parents keep child’s gender under wraps - Yahoo! News:When many couples have a baby, they send out an email to family and friends that fills them in on the > read more
Not the end of the world, but the end of MyBlogLog
Published on 2011-05-23 21:02:00
Saturday was supposed to be the end of the world, or at least judgement day. It didn't happen, and very few expected it to. Harold Camping, whose idea it was, turned out to be a better as a publicist than he was as a prophet.Today is the end of MyBlo > read more
Seeing old friends
Published on 2011-05-13 13:40:00
We have visited several old friends on our holiday travels so far, most of whiom we had not seen for quite a long time.In Clarens we saw Dons and Anneke Kritzinger. Dons was a missiologist at the University of Pretoria, and once produced an interesti > read more
Deteriorating transport infrastructure
Published on 2011-05-03 10:36:00
One of the things we have noticed in our holiday travels is the deterioration of the transport infrastructure in the country.In some provinces, notably the Free State and Mpumalanga, the roads are in poor condition, and the Free State roads were part > read more
On holiday, Free State and Eastern Cape
Published on 2011-04-28 13:45:00
Last Tuesday we left Pretoria for a holiday, travelling around seeing people and places. On the first day we drove to Clarens in nthe Eastern Cape, where the trees, especially the Lombardy poplars, were in their yellow atutumn beauty.On Wednesday we > read more
Afriforum versus Juju: a storm in a teacup
Published on 2011-04-25 02:34:00
For the last week or so the media have been dominated by Afriforum's vendetta against Julius Malema, the leader of the ANC Youth League.They have brought an action against him in the Equality Court, charging him with "hate speech" for a song that he > read more
Farewell to MyBlogLog friends
Published on 2011-04-25 00:50:00
I suppose it's time to say goodbye to my MyBlogLog friends.MyBlogLog provided the little widget that showed who had visited my blog, and, if they were themselves bloggers, provided a link back to their blogs. I've spent many hours surfing blogs that > read more
Book projects nearing completion
Published on 2011-04-22 22:47:00
I’ve been trying to get a lot of stuff finished before Holy Week, and going on holiday in Bright (Easter) week.One of the projects at last nearing completion is the book African initiatives in healing ministry, which I’ve been working on for more > read more
Is this thing working?
Published on 2011-04-22 22:36:00
For the last day or so I (haven't been able to post anything on my Blogger blogs. because it keeps telling me "Illegal post time (format is: hh:mm AM/PM)"And it's doing it again right now!Since it enters the posting date/time automatically, it must b > read more
Racial epithets
Published on 2011-04-15 00:54:00
There has been an interesting discussion on the English usage newsgroup alt.usage.english recently. It started with someone asking whether African-Americans should be referred to as "Black" or "black" (with or without a capital "b".I kept out of it a > read more
Deceptively large
Published on 2011-04-10 00:27:00
On the newsgroup alt.usage.english we have discussions about English usage and the variations in different dialects. One question that came up recently was the meaning of the phrase "deceptively large".Some thought that it meant that a thing was smal > read more
A quick introduction to Russian culture
Published on 2011-04-09 08:01:00
This week I scanned some photos of my first trip to Russia in 1995 into my computer, and posted some on Facebook, and thought I'd post some here too.I flew from Johannesburg to Moscow on an Aeroflot IL62, an interesting experience. When I'd spend two > read more
Alien wasps abduct ants
Published on 2011-04-06 22:17:00
Now here's an alien abduction story with a difference -- Alien Wasps Abduct, Drop Ants to Get Food:Looking for a way to banish ants from your picnic? According to a new study, wasps have developed a unique method for dealing with the pests: airliftin > read more
Trains and individualism
Published on 2011-04-03 20:15:00
You find some really bizarre stuff on the web but this is one of the strangest I've come across yet - on trains and individualism.Dagny Taggart Wept - NYTimes.com:the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Ame > read more
Geoff Moorgas RIP
Published on 2011-03-31 02:57:00
I've just learned of the death of an old friend. Geoff Moorgas died on Saturday 26 March 2011, according to a brief message just received from another old friend, Mark Ramsden. Both Geoff and Mark were originally from Durban, and both were recently l > read more
Death of a serial killer
Published on 2011-03-27 21:43:00
Is it a case of life imitating art, or is it an illustration of the adage "You can't make this stuff up"?Sacto 9-1-1: Dorothea Puente, Sacramento's infamous landlady killer dies:Dorothea Puente, the notorious F Street landlady convicted of killing he > read more
Book Review: The Snowman by Nesbø
Published on 2011-03-26 23:00:00
The Snowman by Jo NesbøMy rating: 4 of 5 starsI came to this book after reading The Leopard by the same author, which I found disappointing. My wife bought it, and I wasn't particularly keen to read it, as I thought it might be similarly disappointi > read more
District 9 versus Avatar
Published on 2011-03-21 00:45:00
Last year I blogged about two science fiction films that had been nominated for Oscars: Oscar battle: District 9 versus Avatar |Khanya, though in the end neither of them won and the winner was a film that had a meaningless (to me) title The hurt lock > read more
I'm an Aristotelean and didn't know it
Published on 2011-03-17 04:40:00
My Philosophy Guru | Mark Vernon:Your recommended philosophy-guru is ARISTOTLE.Key fact: The star pupil of Plato.Must have: A desire to study the world and see what it reveals.Key promise: The good life, which comes from living a virtuous life.Key pe > read more
Rob Bell go to hell
Published on 2011-03-16 17:26:00
It sounds like the kind of chant that could be used by street demonstrators and protesters, like "Turkish troops: out of Cyprus" -- "Rob Bell: go to hell". Lots of my Protestant blogging friends have been writing about the tizwoz in the blogosphere t > read more
Dropbox - Online backup, file sync, and sharing made easy.
Published on 2011-03-12 22:59:00
Various of my friends have invited me to join Dropbox - Online backup, file sync, and sharing made easy..Unfortunately, when I go to the site, I'm, invited to "watch a video".I don't want to "watch a video. I never watch videos on my computer because > read more
Urban Joburg: Japan in Brixton
Published on 2011-03-12 04:53:00
A few weeks ago the Parktown Heritage Society went walkabout in Brixton, Johannesburg, and about 60 people trooped into our church and we explained something of the history of it to them. Now one of them has blogged about it, with pictures, and there > read more
Anatomy of exile
Published on 2011-03-09 02:48:00
This month's synchroblog, in the week in which Lent begins, is on Experiences in the wilderness. March Synchroblog – Experiences In The Wilderness – 3/9/2011 | synchroblog:During the season of Lent we are reminded that all of us experience wilde > read more
Who won the Cold War?
Published on 2011-03-08 21:41:00
Who won the Cold War? In a book I read recently, Book review: A history of the English-speaking peoples | Khanya the author was in no doubt that Maggie Thatcher and Ronnie Reagan "won" the Cold War, but the author's worldview was utterly anachonistic > read more
British Airways: world's worst airline?
Published on 2011-03-03 20:46:00
Not only does British Airways's customer relations leave much to be desired, it seems that they offer some unpleasant extras in the way of in-flight service too.BA Bites!:This small site was built after two horrendous flights taken in January and Feb > read more
Banned books return to shelves in Egypt and Tunisia
Published on 2011-03-01 22:55:00
Like many other people, I've been wondering which way the "velvet revolutions" in Egypt and Tunisia were going to turn. In some places, like Iran, the overthrow of the Shah brought a regime with greater repression. In Egypt the army is now (or one co > read more
Dead: social blogrolling
Published on 2011-02-25 00:00:00
Yet another Yahoo! service bites the dust.I received the following e-mail from Yahoo!We will officially discontinue Yahoo! MyBlogLog effective May 24, 2011. Your agreement with Yahoo!, to the extent that it applies to the Yahoo! MyBlogLog, will termi > read more
Electoral reform
Published on 2011-02-23 20:57:00
In the past couple of weeks I've been seeing and getting into quite a lot of discussions on electoral reform.Here in South Africa our last four elections have been held under the proportional representation system, which, when it was first introduced > read more
Thousands Protest After Wisconsin Governor Threatens to Deploy National Guard to Intimidate Unions | Moral Low Ground
Published on 2011-02-22 03:37:00
They're rioting in Africa, there are earthquakes in New Zealand. It's all over the TV news channels. The US government has been expressing disapproval of an armed forces crackdown on demonstrators in Libya, but I had to turn to Russia Today to learn > read more
Cheap iPads
Published on 2011-02-20 18:31:00
If you are interested in getting an iPad, I can get hold of them through a contact.The numbers are limited and he has 2000 iPads going for less than half price It's first come, first served.He has already sold quite a few (pic is attached below so y > read more
Obituary: Joanne Siegel, model for Superman character Lois Lane, dies at 93 - latimes.com
Published on 2011-02-18 02:14:36
Joanne Siegel, who played a role in the creation of the Superman saga in the 1930s as Joe Shuster's teenage artist's model for Lois Lane and later married the Man of Steel's co-creator, writer Jerry Siegel, has died. She was 93.Siegel, a longtime > read more
A Dozen Bad Ideas for the 21st Century | Free Christian Press
Published on 2011-02-15 05:56:00
Here is a list of of a dozen bad ideas for the 21st century, which I came across on a web site. Actually, I didn't just come across them, a tweet on Twitter led me to them.On the whole I agree that they are not good ideas. Looking at them, I can't se > read more
Mazes and labyrinths
Published on 2011-02-14 22:24:00
Several of my blogging friends have written about mazes and labyrinths, so if any of them are reading this they might like to take a look at this post on Cherie's Place.Cherie's Place - Leeds Castle – Maze:...walked into the Maze. The puzzle was q > read more
Crisis teams
Published on 2011-02-12 23:31:00
The following account of a teenager being killed in a road accident highlights some strange (to me) US cultural practices, which seem to be spreading to other places, and I wonder if anthropologists or sociologists have studied them. It also illustra > read more
Vote with your wheels
Published on 2011-02-11 04:14:00
Someone has suggested a protest against the new Gauteng freeway tolling system -- a #votewithyourwheels campaign. Tweet and retweet #votewithyourwheelsHere's what to do:On the day tolling starts, every taxi, bus, truck and car should make for an onra > read more
FF Plus - Tollgate Petition
Published on 2011-02-10 04:47:00
I never imagined that the day would come when I would sympathise with any cause promoted by the far-rightwing Freedom Front Plus Party, but I do sympathise with their campaign against the new toll roads: FF Plus - Tollgate Petition.Toll roads were in > read more
Religion and politics
Published on 2011-02-08 23:37:00
Religion and politics don't mix -- well that's what the pietistic evangelicals of the religious right used to tell us back in the days of apartheid. Therefore, they concluded, Christians should not criticise political leaders and their policy of apar > read more
Zimbabwe: Harare Descends Into Chaos As Ruling Party Militia Loot Shops
Published on 2011-02-08 03:58:00
What's the difference between Zimbabwe and Egypt?In Egypt they're protesting for democracy; in Zimbabwe they're rioting against it. allAfrica.com: Zimbabwe: Harare Descends Into Chaos As Ruling Party Militia Loot Shops:Harare came to a standstill on > read more
False neutrality
Published on 2011-02-03 20:52:00
Yesterday the Western media were full of stories about Egypt. Australia might have vanished off the face of the planet (is it still there?) and we wouldn't have known. "Breaking News" strips at the bottom of the screen told us that Queensland was abo > read more
Book Review: Portobello, by Ruth Rendell
Published on 2011-02-02 23:38:00
Portobello by Ruth RendellMy rating: 3 of 5 starsLondon's Portobello Road got its name from the War of Jenkins's Ear and is the setting of this book, where several people's lives intersect in various ways, sometimes accidentally, but also sometimes w > read more
AU appoints Mugabe mediator in Ivory Coast crisis
Published on 2011-01-30 08:47:00
The African Union has appointed Robert Mugabe as a mediator in the Ivory Coast crisis. The mind boggles. Perhaps he'll use it as an opportunity prepare to flee there when the Zimbabwe people rise up like those of Egypt and Tunisia to toss him out. AU > read more
Stability
Published on 2011-01-26 00:18:00
Stability is an important and valuable quality in a country, except when it isn't. Stable countries promote peace, development and freedom, except when they don't.How do we know whether they do or don't?By believing what the US State Department tells > read more
Civilized and uncivilized responses to pirates
Published on 2011-01-24 07:06:00
For some years now piracy has been endemic off the Horn of Africa and one of the strange cultural phenomena of our day, which probably deserves some anthropological study, is the ambivalent Western response to piracy, which ranges from the romanticis > read more
Book reviews: two whodunits
Published on 2011-01-20 22:20:00
I was given a whole bunch of whodunits for Christmas, and have gradually been working my way through them all as bed-time reading.The Leopard by Jo NesbøMy rating: 3 of 5 starsThis is the third book I have read by Jo Nesbø, where the protagonist is > read more
Hijacking words: Urban Dictionary: Communitarianism
Published on 2011-01-17 18:55:00
Having at one time been an editor of academic texts I am interested in words and meaning, and especially in the way words are sometimes used to obscure and confuse meaning rather than to communicate meaning. Words can sometimes be "hijacked" or "skun > read more
Christian and liberal?
Published on 2011-01-16 22:32:00
In a recent comment on this blog Mark Richardson of Australia expressed the view that Christianity and liberalism were incompatible: Notes from underground: Clarissa's Blog: Being Hated by Conservatives vs Being Hated by Liberals:I'm a little surpris > read more
Belarus: Zimbabwe in Europe or socialist paradise?
Published on 2011-01-16 20:18:00
I've just read two contradictory accounts of Belarus in blogs that I read. I've never been to Belarus, so have no firsthand experience of the place.Neil Clark: Letter from Minsk: Belarus- a country unspoilt by capitalism:This is a capital city where > read more
Damage Control: the independent homeland of BapetiKosovoti
Published on 2011-01-16 09:28:00
No country in their right mind recognised the the independence of Mickey Mouse apartheid republics like Bophutatswana and Transkei, but those who created the independent homeland republic of BapetiKosovoti are now hastening to do damage control. I do > read more
Clarissa's Blog: Being Hated by Conservatives vs Being Hated by Liberals
Published on 2011-01-14 21:57:00
One of the characteristics of the emerging postmodern age is that it is an age of communication without community. Marshall McLuhan's global village is divided and faction-ridden. Over the last 20 years of participating in the internet (with a small > read more
Twitter strikes a blow for freedom
Published on 2011-01-11 21:17:00
There's quite a lot of talk about "big government" these days, so kudos to Twitter for striking a blow against it and standing up for Wikileaks. Twitter’s Response to WikiLeaks Subpoena Should Be the Industry Standard | Wired.com:Twitter and other > read more
Kill the boer, kill the congresswoman
Published on 2011-01-08 22:22:00
Last year Julius Malema (whom some refer to as Kiddi Amin) of the ANC Youth League was criticised for singing a song described in the media as "Kill the boer, kill the farmer". And shortly after the controversy AWB leader Eugene Terreblanche was kill > read more
Trainers, sneakers, plimsolls and tackies
Published on 2011-01-08 03:50:00
One of the perennial topics of discussion in the alt.usage.english newsgroup is the different versions of books published in the USA and in Britain, and the kinds of things that are changed by publishers on both sides of the Atlantic. One of the most > read more
Cider mystery
Published on 2011-01-07 07:38:00
Today was our second Christmas. Yesterday I went to St Nicholas of Japan Church in Brixton for Theophany (Epiphany), and today we went to St Thomas's in Sunninghill, which is on the old calendar, for Christmas. So Christmas comes twice a year. Afterw > read more
Water table
Published on 2011-01-04 23:57:00
Last night it rained, and this morning, though the rain had stopped, there was water running down the street. It comes from the vacant land on the left, behind the concrete fence. The fence was erected a few months ago by the railways -- the vacant l > read more
Death in the neigbourhood
Published on 2011-01-02 03:55:00
When I was in Greece in 1998 and 2000 I noticed lots of roadside shrines marking places where had been killed in motor accidents, and they were beginning to make their appearance in Albania as well. They have also been becoming more common in South A > read more
My very own Internet stalkers?
Published on 2011-01-01 23:16:00
I seem to have got my very own Internet stalkers, or perhaps I share them with a zillion other people.I got an e-mail this morning, with the heading:This is pretty interesting...and it goes on to say:Colin Bruce sent you a private messageI keep getti > read more