Aquila Online

27dinner Jozi Roundup

// July 29th, 2007 // 12 Comments » // Geek Dinners, Photos

It’s good to be back in the swing of things. Last night’s 27dinner was just the thing I needed to take a break from the hectic work schedule and the recent palaver around some tests I had done (they came back clean and all is fine thanks).

As i was saying, last night’s 27dinner was a slighly low-key event, judging by the number of people and the evident lack of familiar faces in attendance. That being said, the July 27dinner Johannesburg held at the M&A in Sandton was still a decent networking event.

Of course, Victoire was by my side, and it was good to see Mike, Scott (great presentation a-la-Dick Hardt style), Lantz, Armand, Thea, Andre SC, Andre O, Craig, Nikki, Paul, Gina, Ivo, Duncan (from the clan McLeod), Tyler, Deshanta and all the others I chatted to. If I missed your name and/or I forgot to take a card I’m really sorry, my short-term memory is shot at the moment.

Another highlight for me was of course the fact that I had won a Sony DVD video camera, sponsored by Zoopy, and was supposed to receive it at the event. Mike unfortunately left it at home, but handed over a pack of writable DVDs in the meantime.

As per usual, I took a plethora of pictures and they can all be viewed on my flickr account, in the 27dinner July photoset. Additionally, as promised, I created some content for the guys and gals at Zoopy and you can check out a video montage of the 27dinner July pictures over at my profile. I have provided the video in the post, after the jump below.

The music used in the video clip is called Lovely Days by DJ Webster, which is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license.

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No really I am fine

// July 11th, 2007 // 13 Comments » // General

Finally, after weeks of waiting and a series of tests the verdict is finally in…I have the results back from my doctor.

For those who haven’t been keeping tabs lately, the last few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind tour of waiting rooms, white walls, rubber gloves, magnetic thumping, sonar devices, hospital food, purple pills, snow in Johannesburg and sticky conductive gel. 

It turned out that the initial abnormal activity found in my first EEG (I think it was the headache from hitting the wall and then the floor) didn’t show up anywhere else. 

The MRI came back clean – I have a cool looking brain and we have confirmed that it does work.  Bloodwork came back 100% and the cardiologist thought I had an excellently shaped heart. Even the 24-hour EEG which had my head connected to 22 wires and was sensitive enough to spike each time I blinked, came back normal.

It was just the 10 day sick leave that actually had me catching a cold.

The doctor is stumped.  She can not believe that nothing else showed up on any of the tests, although I know what happened subsequent to the initial incident (nudge, nudge, wink, wink).  So, with that I’ve been declared fighting fit and 100% strong.  Nothing wrong, nothing to worry about.  No more poking and prodding.

So from my side, just a quick thanks to everyone for the sms’, e-mails, phone calls and comments of support.  I really appreciate it. 

It’s business as usual.  Oh, and don’t tell Kermit, I think he’ll freak out.

Eish She’s Broken

// July 7th, 2007 // 5 Comments » // Cars & Bikes

The most unfortunate thing happened recently. I was driving to Secunda a while ago and was merrily cruising along when a truck transporting sand came from the opposite direction.

As we passed each other a clump of sand shot off the side of the truck and hit the front end of my grille. The knock wasn’t very loud and at the time I was quite unhappy that it struck me, but I didn’t think it damaged anything.

Until I reached my destination that is. Turns out that it took a chunk off the badge and the accentuating metal piece holding it to the grille also flew off. The badge and grille never stood a chance.

More pictures over at my Volvo Flickr set.

Turns out this little incident will cost me R1,700 to replace the full grille and badge unit. Eish.

Links for 2007-07-04

// July 5th, 2007 // 1 Comment » // Interesting

• KR Connect: A Cool Idea
  Here’s a cool idea. Get CEO’s to don Okinawan shirts, turn down the air conditioners and reduce global warming in the process.
• Podcasting Toolbox
  Nifty collection of over 70 Podcasting tools and resources for all the newbie and old hat podcasters.
• Vandelay Website Design
  Another great collection of links to find the perfect colors for your website or blog.
• Computerworld: 15 free security programs that work
  Exactly what the name says, 15 free security programs that really do work. From firewalls, spyware busters, antivirus software, rootkit killers to general Internet security tools. A must view for everyone who connects to the internet.
• How to Fold a Paper Rose
  Perfect cure for boredom – try these (not so simple) steps and learn how to fold a paper rose.

Some Cape Town Pictures

// July 5th, 2007 // 5 Comments » // Photos

It’s been absolute ages since I’ve been able to get around uploading some of the pictures of our (not so recent) Cape Town trip to my Flickr account.

Head on over to my Flickr Cape Town set to check out some of the bits and bobs that we snapped on our holiday.

A special mention goes out to Chef Reuben Riffel for his mouth watering Chocolate Fondant, it was an absolute treat.

I’m still sifting through the 850-odd pictures that we took on our trip, so I will be posting some more pics soon.