the corner office

Despite having a lot of stuff to get through this weekend, it's proceeded at a leisurely pace thus far. Last night Ronwen and I went to a 'reunion' dinner at T's place, meeting up with some friends I haven't seen in years. I'm not sure what's more frightening - how much time passes before seeing old friends again, or allowing that time to pass in the first place. We had a great time seeing everyone, and I hope it's not that long next time around.

Home around midnight, and since my body clock is now in shock mode, crashed straight away. Up this morning, a bit of housekeeping, before heading off to Cresta for breakfast at lunchtime. Got home this afternoon, read and slept. Zzzz.

Hmm. What else? I've been having lots of Career Thoughts recently. I can see a long treatise on the subject coming. In essence it boils down to a bit of a trade-off. Java is obviously where the market is going, but I do still have hankerings that my degree is pointing me to - I'm just not completely sure what it is that I really want - or at least, I'm not sure if what looks like the right way to go is the way I want to go. We'll see...

This sucks, I am a wuss, but I don't think my poor unhealthy mortal frame was quite ready for this. My mobility is now seriously... constrained. When it genuinely hurts trying to type, you know you've overdone it.

First session with Drill Instructor (should that be Storm Trooper?) Burton. He stuffed me up six-love.

Thankfully, Virgin Active Randburg isn't too busy at 7 in the morning, so there were less people to see me being reduced to human rubble.

I'd type more but it hurts too much.

Spoke to W, he bein' personal trainer, and he can't make it tonight, and he reckons that working out in the evenings, as was The Plan, isn't ideal for me as the gym gets seriously busy at night.

In a fit of sheer, utter, blinding, unmitigated stupidity, I said I'd change to the 7 AM slot henceforth. My 7AM is the equivalent of the rest of the world's 4AM. What was a I thinking?

Ouch. First session tomorrow...

I must learn not to do this. I promise Ronwen I'll travel through to work with her, meaning I have to rise at a 'human' time. Do I then retire at a 'human' time the night before and get a good night's rest? Noooooo, not me.

Ronwen, bless her, invariably says 'no need, I'll travel in alone' the next morning, but by then it's a matter of Honour, and it's all downhill from there.

My eyeballs are real itchy today.

So there I was, seeing more hype build up about this whole Orkut malarkey, and I discover that it's invitation only.

There are crazy mute desert-dwelling hermits who are better connected than I am, so I'm not getting my hopes up. Not that it makes much difference in my world, but hey. Rejection always hurts.

Ronwen & I registered at UNISA today. Schlepped to Pretoria in the rain, with me bleary-eyed and sleep deprived. I got myself re-registered for the subjects I cancelled last year, and Ronwen got herself signed up for some archeology type courses.

Nothing new or surprising in my subjects given that these subjects are all Take 2. The majority are pretty much the same - same textbooks, same style tutorial letters, and probaby same assignment questions :-)

I'm pleased to see, though, that the Computer Graphics course has been revamped. Last year was the first time UNISA offered the course and it was a big fat mess. This time around the starting tutorial letter has a huge disclaimer, advising those who don't know their maths and C++ to gtfo now. Lessons hard learned from last year, I think. We also have a real textbook instead of the work-in-progress pdfs from last year, and a list of recommended reading on OpenGL, graphics theory and mathematics the length of my arm.

Time will tell, but I'm excited about the courses (again, Bob). Sustaining the motivation will be another thing, but lessee.

We stopped off at BJs Over The Highway on the way home for lunch, popped in to Armstrongs Books in Linden to get textbooks, and got ourselves home. It's still raining, which isn't conducive to work: all I want to do is curl up on the couch and sleep.

Been a blur of work since the weekend, so not much to report that hasn't been blogged about already.

Dog news: we suspect that Tupac is pregnant. Hrrrm.

More dog news: we discovered that Cerberus' real name is 'Chillies'. We're sticking with Cerberus.

Cerberus was reportedly visiting someone-or-the-other at their farm last week, and I can believe it: she now smells like a cow crapped all over her. She's not being allowed inside our flat. Ever again.

Weather: it's been raining since the weekend. I'm hoping this is a repeat of 2000, when it rained nonstop from Jan to March. Every time it rains for more than an hour on end, that's what I hope for. Never seems to happen.

On the topic of rain, it seems to have flushed out some horrid critters, including our first Parktown Prawn of the year. (See this post on Julian's site for a bit o' discussion.) Ronwen was amazingly calm considering the thing was scuttling around her feet in the kitchen when I noticed it. She also handled the role of 'mop shepherd' pretty adroitly while I Doomed the poor critter to Prawn Heaven.

Cleaning out my (personal) mail file with its hundreds of yet-unread mails, and hidden in a pile of subterania emails was news that Jaco Visser passed away in October last year. I can't find any more details except for a blog entry that mentions that he took his own life.

Man, that's just wrong. I knew Jaco from the online South African 'net.goth' community in the late '90's. Back then there were a handful of us and we all frequented the same online (and real-life) haunts. He was lead guitarist for a Joburg goth band called the Eternal Chapter. I remember interviewing him and fellow band-member Thomas for a local zine in '98. The EC were a Christian group and despite gaining 'mainstream' acceptance, they always took a bit of flak for their beliefs from parts of a community that had its head too far up its own arse. Jaco was a really decent bloke. Quiet, down to earth, no pretension, never had a bad word to say about anyone. Something I really respected about him was how he was firm and up-front about his beliefs, but never judgemental about people who differed from him.

Musically, the EC were a great band. I have a copy of their debut album, and even an early demo CD which I went and picked up from Jaco at his flat in Linden way back when. If my memory serves, his bedroom had two things: a bed, and his guitar. He was a kick-ass guitarist, and this pic from a gig from that time pretty much sums up how I've always remembered him.

I dunno what drove someone like him to take his own life. Sad...

I just got chastised (slightly) for not having updated my blog since Thursday. It appears that my loved ones enjoy their Corner Office 'fix' each day.

This ties into something I've been mulling a bit, recently. When I started this blog, I wanted it to be as much a 'diary' (a personal history) as it was a 'blog' (a sharing tool). While blogs may be personal in nature, they're generally less focused on the mundane did-this-did-that minutae that a diary might have, and are more directed towards an audience other than the author and stalkers.

That's the distinction I make, anyhow, and while I enjoy foisting content upon others, I also want to make an effort to go back to the more posterity-focused 'Dear Diary' type posts that I've almost completely stopped doing.

I hope this doesn't bore the heck out of some of you who do follow my blog (bless you), but this might be a good time to point out that I do have two sets of RSS feeds, and if the personal waffle doesn't appeal, then the technical RSS feed (long since gone) might do the trick.