be the person you'd like to be?

I found this on a Mail and Guardian article. Make's one think. Considering that we are all dying, should it only be the terminally ill who live as if they are? Here are the 4 questions to ask yourself about your life and relationships.

• If I were to die tomorrow, am I satisfied with my life as I'm living it? What, if anything, would I change?
  
• If I were to be given two years to live, how would I spend the time? Is there anything that I would really love to do that I should consider bringing forward -- is that valid even if I'm not terminally ill?
  
• If I were to die only several decades from now, is my current way of living and working leading my life satisfactorily towards the obituary that I’d like to be read out at my funeral?
  
• And, finally, this group of questions is a constant: am I happy enough with how things are in the different relationships that are important to me in my life? Is there any relationship that is "unresolved", that if that party were to die, I would regret not having made peace?

be-the-person-youd-like-to be.
Helena Dolny

What to do if you suspect your child has contracted architecture.

First of all, ignore the reaction of banishment , While Architecture is a highly contagiousness deseas, if caught early enough it can be uprooted before it has chance to take a foot hold. And infect others with a life, of suffering - and pain at every badly built monstrosity, you and others do not have to live this way.
There are some tell tale signs of infection. If you child is seen staring at walls and door jam's, you have an infection. Also it is important to be aware of any wearing of black cloths, square rimmed glass, and any attachment to books such as 'the fountainhead' or 'invisible cities' is to be noted, particularly in the early stages of contamination. If your child is seen with messy hair - send them to the bathroom immediately! the carrying of small black notebooks and tell tale ink stained fingers at symptoms of advanced degeneration and should be dealt with accordingly.

There is hope! Should you suspect your child of architecture, immediately remove your family to a cave in the Himalayas. in order to be free from all square forms. Alternativly a trip to visit any of Antonio Gaudi's works may alleviate the right angles symptoms. However it is vital that the child be kept away from places of extreme right angled-ness.
If your child is caught wearing black or purchasing square black framed glasses. Point out to them the joys of skate boarding or surfing,or take them to a nudists colony where they might recuperating quietly.
For those with children showing signs of sever degeneration, Point out to them a joys of mathematics, or accountancy. By them a slide rulle, or give them a holiday at KPMG or SASOL.
The removal of all self harming objects is recommend in all cases , not black pens or ink, no note pads or paper of any kind is to be tolerated. Computers where they are present pose a massive risk, and are to be eliminated from the diet.
The god complex, resulting from contamination is to be eradicated with a short course of project managements therapy.... where by the subject is to be sealed into a sound proof room 'for the protection of the administers ears' and placed together with a project manager, who is two weeks over dead line. And be strapped down to avoid any self harm which might result.
However if all else fails allow them to continue with architecture, in a secure location away form normal society and adored with a bell warning locals to keep distance for fear if infection is extremely high.

municipal workers do we need em?

Looking, at the news this morning the headline reads : municipal strike continues as talks falter, following on from if they don't pay us we will keep striking and swamu condemns strike violence.
So a i did a quick search through the M and G article file, it turns out their last strike for 15% increase was in july of 2009 they got 11% , now i have not had one cent pay increase in 3 years, dispirit having changed jobs and doing significanty more work with more responsibility. Clearly the economy is in the dwange as my dad would say.
so here is my list,
municipal workers marched or striked in
April 2010
July 2009
10 Oct 2008
19 September 2007
July 2006
and 12 July 2005......
you get the picture. what im thinking is do we need them? these guys make it an annual ritual of striking before negociating with anyone. they are not exacly hugly skilled labourers. and there is still a 30% + unemployment rate in this country. give the jobs to those who want them. this lot clearly doesn't want to work. thats almost 6 months of not working in 5 years, the last municipal strike cost us 15 000 000 a day and they striked for over a 2 weeks what that 2.1 billion rand!
enough already! pick up the trash.

Road Rage

Two executives , a cyclist and some random passer by all on a street...... sounds like the start of a bad joke right? Wrong ! This is the scene I witnessed this morning while driving to work. Right in front of my car this agro guy stops his car get out and goes after the guy in the car in front of him with murderous intent, torn cloths and a strangle hold neck grip later, with a bemused looking cyclist who is about 5.9 and weights about 55kg desperatly trying to get them to stop. These 6.2 kind of okes it was horrendous. All this over what?, maybe a tiny ding on his bumper.

It however got me thinking , what causes this kind of aggressive display? and what possess other wise well off appearing, exectutive types; they where driving and Audi and a Mercedes-Benz, one assumes that they have insurance. Is it a gernal feeling of unease which has been purmeating the country of late , or the kids at home or just over sleeping or impending Friday morning board meetings? The fact it, that although its been a while since I've seen a good old road rage incidence.
This kind of event is all too common in South Africa. People have been up in each others faces a whole lot recently. There are the overly aggressive air head AVB supported who are all of to wage a war. There are the over aggressive air head ancyl supporters off to stage a revolution. Almost every day we hear about some political faction or the other threatening to destabilise the country, its their trump card.

Which leads me to believe, ' is something rotten in the state of South Africa' . Melcome Gladwell would have us believe, that it is purely a pride things we are not unlike America made up of nations of quite aggressive tendency's, The Afrikaans who are famously aggressive bunch. The Zulu's represented by the Zuma faction, who praise Shaka a tyrant who for fun ran his worriers over thorn veld and executed anyone that flinched by throwing them off a cliff while he watched!
We've got the English/ Scottish / Irish descendants remember there is a reason the English never really got control of either of those nations. So all in all a melting pot for disaster when stressed. most of these people will sooner get aggressive than any bunch of people in the known world.

But is there another reason ?

Rugby

Did you see the game tonight? Lions v Chiefs? final score , 65 to 72. Ok so the good old boys lost sure but what a match, look at the stats thats 137 total points in a match lasting 80 mins, thats thats almost one point per 30 seconds. Now thas rugby. Although one must ask about the loins strategy let the other side rack uo points then work reakky hard to catch up, half time , second half same thing and that last tri was agonising they sat on that tri line for what 5 - 10 min. you know chewing the cud, smelling the roses.

Johburg, a word to the wise, take some time get out from your resturants, and clubs on a friday night, pack a pick nick, drink beer, eat billtong and worse rolls and get down to eles park opps sorry my bad coke a cola park, to watch the boys pulvarise each other for 2 hours, you shant regrat it. This was my first vist to the park I must say, and after living in the city ten years, i cany believe its taken me that long to get down there. Sure is in door fontein and the drive in is certainly creative but you siply must go.

There truely is nothing like an evening at the rugby, to cement the true south african experiance. Although one is a little concered about all those anti racism campagiegns, admitidy- there were scant few people of colour in the stadium tonight, for anyone to have been racist towards. Which i feel is a pity. I gues one feels alot of comraderie while yelling at a common enemy, even if its just a game. and our brother from other mothers sure do bring some colour to a rather calvanist sceen. I guess what im saying is, get out from your pubs, your clubs , coffee bars, your shabeens , you local jolls and come on down and check it out one might even be pleasantly surprized at what you can do for less cash that a movie!

All i can say is i'll be back.

ladies at gym

I am a recent gym member, I held out as long as a could be there you go, like facebook the gym will eventually get you. Everyone's doing it. you can run but you cant hide and alas once they've got your cash you're trapped along with all the reasons you now remember why you swore you'd never do it.

Locker rooms should not be frequented by people over the age of 9, call it my introduction to locker rooms in the catholic school I attended by really some people, are just exhibitionist.The locker room is not you house, in fact im not sure you should be doing what some people are doing in the locker rooms even in your house the neighbour would complain.! Take yesterday, I innocently enter the locker gym bag in tow and am confronted by an entirly buck naked woman blow drying her hair. upside down. I felt better acquainted with her nether regions than I her gynaecologist. I swear I could see her clitoris. This was by the way just a casual oh my word glance sort of glance.

Secondly I am utterly convince that gyms don't work, my not 100% sure mind you, but there are large number of horribly over weight people, who one wonders would not be better advised to look themselves deeply in the mirror and say I will not eat that second cookie. There are almost no normal people there, they include at casual glance the horribly obese, the anorexicly skinny, and those with such poor mucle tone as to deserve the right not to exercise. and a bunch of overly energetic gym instructors who job it appears it to torch-er people, in a manner oddly reminiscent of Nazi death camps at Auschwitz. The aught to be a doctor in white coat, totting a clip board at the door some sort of standard gym weigh in, if one is found to be under weight one is forced to eat a big mac and a coke, sent home to gain weight before entry is to be permitted. Secondly having been found to be obese sent home to loose some more before attempting exersize, i swear there could be some seriouse heart attacks lurking in the gym, one wonders if they do have a doctor on retainer, although judging by the 'you train here at your own risk' signs proberbly not.

The new gym member is confronted with, a number of choices in cloths and gym accesories, one again people apear to lan into two catagories, those who go home shower, pick a specific gym out fit, do their make up and hair and then head off to socialize and pretend to do some exersize. then there are those who come strait from work aparently clothed in work attair and looking like they've had a hard day. Their are of course seriouse gym phopas one come accross, leason no one, do not wear a g-string to the gym perticularly if you are a large bottomed african lady. it will show and you will spend most of your gym session try despiratly to conceal the thing with jersyes and so on. Ladies its ok, sensable undear wear it acceptible at the gym, with exeption of granny panties. secondly licra should come with a warning lable just say no! if your over 70 kg and a woman! it was designed for super models who eat crack in order to stay slender, so unless your a super model lycra is genrally a bad idea. In the pool, please ladies do shave, being confronted by the amazon jungle at 5:30 pm when innocently glancing up from a lap is the stuff of night mares; even if its blond. save your feminist statments for the armpits or move to france I hear hair is in over there.

Finaly, should you actually manage to do some exersize, do try and smile your not at the office. this is not work, if it feels thus I encourage you to find some form of exersize you like. You'll enjoy it more, and ultimatly get fit too!

concerning the demise if imagination

Concernining the demise of imagination; what is it with poeple these days, If I must hear one more comment on, The time travelar wife, which incluedes the words, toughtouly unbilievable, I may just have yo delare, not unlike niche, imagination is dead. We have lost it somewhere in our internet genrarated univers, its gone on long enough, we must give the universal imagination a shock, with a difribulator.
It is not that we are not creative, but rather one can no longer believe in fairy tales, we are incapable of suspending disbilief, even for the hour or two it takes to tell a story. Even the finer joys of the story where lost on my book club. Must of which got lost in the impossible concept and never fully apreciated, the joy of the story just for the stories sake. Do we no longer, tell tales? or can we in our media drowned world find a point, to dream or imagine an alternative world just for fun?
And Why? at what point in our, individual naratives did we throw out, day dreaming and imaginative persuist as unimportant? One feels, where one lacks imagination, one lack's the simple joy of imagining alternative realities for ourselves and others. I can remembers a child hood filled with, talking rats and tales of secrete gardens , and magical kingdoms and puff and magic dragon , and georges marvelouse medicen, not to mention, revolting rhymes to name but a few favouriets, growing up with a black and white tv, might have hads its percs, the world devised by ones imagination is far more colourfull. I can all to well remember that place at the bottom of the farm where we were pirates, defending our ship, or mariens protecting our forts and so on and on. i vividly remeber being about 6 walking through the forest behind a fiends house with my brother singing "every where we go, people whant to know......" Am i an adult out of touch with reality? No on the contrary, i am able to feel deaply and imagine the plight of people everywhere, precicly because, my mum bother to cultivate out imaginations as widly as possible. Will we as a nation become less human as a result of being unimaginative? one wonders?