My last ...

I know that no one but God can. I regret the Tuesdays I missed. Sorry,
but my condition has led me away from Fridays. I desperately wanna go
back, but I wont be accepted for I've gone beyond the trash and into
darkness too many times. It's not self rejection. I have experienced
it. I'm not accepted. Like the time I came back. Everything is so
damned tight that it would be impossible for me to return. I have gone
beyond your ranks. I'm just that guy that went too far, that guy who
is beyond help. Pray for him, but don't bother accepting him, loving
him or even batting an eyelid.

He doesn't listen, he doesn't run back. He doesn't repent, he doesn't
want. He says he is in a place where quick fixes don't exist - he
won't accept that they will work. He just doesn't care anymore, even
though he admits his darkest faults to your face.

I regret walking away from a loving friendship. I regret spending so
much time on a gathering that will never accept me for who I am, who I
was and who I will become in the loving body of Christ. I won't stop
helping those who need my support - that's just unethical and rude.

It doesn't matter what more I try explain - the deal is set and the
love has dried up. Satan is always on the prowl and will maul the next
person who is vulnerable, lazy and sick, making sure the love in close
friendships dies to a mere care. I care about my dogs, but they aren't
in the bigger picture so it is pointless to love them. Why love
something that doesn't seem to want to grow? Why waste love when a
care is less to bother about and easier to handle?

What is Love?
It's the biggest debate known to mankind.
It's such a heavy burden to carry when the person you love has drifted
away beyond your help.

I'm talking about the Love intended for (with) the commandment that
tells us to love one another..

Love is who God is.
Love is more than friendship.
Love is going beyond just love.

I suck at it by the way!
I will love like Jesus did, even when those around have less and less
love for me.

I feel like running away and never returning.
I won't run. I'll walk away till the season is over.

What does God explicitly forbid?
What have I been doing for the last few months?
I have been testing God, and it has not been working.

Know that sheep story? Where the one went missing?
I was like that sheep. God rescued me.
And that's when the story is meant to stop, but I tried to make it continue.
I went missing on purpose and then came back fustrated after God kept
telling me that it would not work.
Some of the flock did not know me and a few were new to me.
Away I went.
Further than I had gone before.
Knowing that this was the only way to really test God.

After the first test, I was at least halfway further than I had gone
before the test. Nothing happened, so I decided to give it another go.
The border was close and I knew it was impossible to cross.
As I began the second test, I noticed a bright yellow sign that said
to caution before going past. It couldn't be for me, I was walking on
the road, I was not driving.

I got into a boat by the edge of the lake. It was fully automated! All
I had to do was to choose my direction for traveling to the other side
of the lake. By nightfall I decided to test God, but not test him in
an open way, secretly test God. I said if he could take the reigns, so
to speak, of the boat and could get me to the other side by morning, I
would run back to camp.
I woke up the next morning and found the lake had turned to salt. I
got out of the boat to find something to eat. After a brilliant
breakfast prepared by the chef and his family, I returned to the boat.
The chef's brother followed me and I heard him ask if I believed in
the keeper of the camp I came from. When I said I did, he laughed at
me and said many had perished because of the keeper of my camp.

The boat was not there. There was a lake full of water. Where the boat
once stood were several large boulders sunk deep into the grassy bank.
How could there ever had been a boat. As I sat on the boulders, the
man mocked me and blatantly told me that the keeper is not to be
trusted.

NO!!!

As I screamed out towards the camp that I had left before beginning my
tests, the man sat next to me and assured me that I was in safe hands
and that I should spend the night. I asked to be left alone and told
the man that I would return by nightfall. Soon after he left, I
thanked God that I had got here peacefully. I heard a noise and
listened carefully. It sounded as though someone asked how I could be
thanking God before I had even met him. The girls noticed that I was
listening. As they ran off I heard that tomorrow would be the day that
I met God.

I decided to find another way past this lake to get to the other side.
I started jogging. The lake went on for a long distance in front of
me, so I decided to run instead. Funny, I never got tired of running.
By the time it started to get dark, I saw a bridge-like structure
across the most narrow part of the lake. Between where I stood and
this structure, was a dense thicket full of bramble and infested with
nettles. I could barely see in front of me. Nightfall was rearing it's
head.

I was not dead. I still had my body. The boat must have drifted off.
How could that man have so little faith about God. Why did he call God
the keeper? I would not be meeting God yet, besides, where were they
getting all their luxuries from? It didnt make sense. They had
chocolate crates stacked high behind the house. They had light-speed
internet without any wires or antennas. They had so much stuff. It was
as though they were related. They knew how I liked my coffee and meat
and eggs and everything else.

I couldn't see where I was going. All I knew was that if the water was
deeper on the right, then I was heading in the correct direction to
get to the bridge. I could hear voices behind me. The chef and his
family were all out looking for me. Somebody saw where my footprints
led to. I then heard laughing and the chef's booming voice, "We will
not come after you, but be warned! If you are not back by morning, you
will be brought back to our home in chains where you will meet our God
and become his slave. If you come back with us now, you will get to
meet our God and he will give you riches beyond your dreams." "You
have thirty minutes before we start heading back to our warm home,"
came the voice of the chef's brother.

God's slave? God's pimped up friend?
I get to meet God?

Surely I would die if I met God?
I decided to keep heading for the bridge - either way, I would surely die.

I was itchy and sore all over. Blood was everywhere. I had cuts so
deep I could see to my bone.
It was full moon by the time I got to the other side of the thicket. I
was happy with myself that I had come this far. I danced on the spot
and praised God. There was indeed a bridge. I was promised life and I
at one time could not wait to get this promised life.
I was not about to give up and die!

I bathed myself in the lake and almost died from doing so - the lake
was saltier that the sea, yet it did not taste much like salt. I could
barely see out of my now fiery-burning eyes. Each step was painful. I
kept crying out to God for help. This bridge had more holes than
actual structure. It was worse than a balancing beam. I was constantly
praying for God's strength to get me to the other side. Midway the
wind started howling and I came bitterly close to falling off many,
many times. During the last stretch, I did fall, but managed to stay
on the bridge by my fingertips. As I prayed it felt as though I was
given the strength to lift myself back upon the bridge.

Light started appearing over the horizon by the time I got to the
other side of the lake. I didn't waste any time. I started singing
praise songs and I kept singing with glee as I sprinted back to camp.
There were many wrong turns on the way and the wind kept on blowing
towards me, going behind me. There were times when I wished for death,
but during those times I prayed even more.

I hardly recognized the camp. Even though it was dark, I could see a
glow of colourful lights from far off.
I heard music from what sounded like a party. As I turned the corner,
everything went dark and quiet. Not that I expected to see anyone or
thing. As I put my foot through the threshold of camp, there came a
dramatic chorus of electric guitars repeating a riff of sorts. I then
heard what sounded like an announcer announcing the arrival of the
special guest.

At last! I got to the kitchen door. I quietly opened the door and I
was met with the screaming and shouting of my name. That was not the
kitchen. I had just entered the largest most happening party I had
ever seen and to top it off, I was the special guest!
They saw me coming back to camp and held a celebration party to
celebrate my return to camp. The riff that I had heard as I entered
camp changed into worship songs. Aah, what a wonderful event this was.
We were worshiping God with gusto and every now and then I'd bump into
old friends and we would be swept away to the dance floor to dance the
night away in praise to God for bringing me safely back!

I heard that the people on the other side of the lake were lost and
that when they eventually met the god that the chef's family spoke
about, they were led away into the depths of his lair for his
entertainment. Those that found the bridge and fell into the lake were
brought before this god and made for his biggest entertainment.

---
Thanks be to God that I can still call out to him.
I do not wish to cross the lake in the boat anymore. All I want to do
is run back to to God. It's just that the manual-override is so
difficult to implement. I will not give up!

I feel that my season is to be lived out in another camp. To all my
friends in my camp, I will miss you and I will be back when this
season of my life is over and I find God.
---

!!NB: I will be jumping ship soon, but I'll leave this archive where
it is - you should find me with my nickname from BYSA Summer Camp in
2005/6 that I got from eating a snack out of cans...

Tuesday 28 July 2009

Today I learnt how not to go about an unexpected meeting..

Yes, I had an unexpected meeting with a client, who I thought was
after some answers about technical related things.
After explaining in plain English why mail and a suspended
domain.co.za would not work... I was then told about things that were
not done ( I explained I wasnt employed back then ) and yada yada yada

To cut a long story short, I have learnt to not offer to call the
manager, but to insist upon calling a manager when I have no idea
what's going on and both party's time is being wasted. Most
importantly, close the door... and a few other things!

I finished the linux billing, queried a domain transfer that had no
fax authorizing the transfer, checked information on the sales system,
discovered that I am the one to edit the wiki, forgot to ask Ryan et
al some questions, learnt about dynamic zone files, etc.

The funny part?
I found out that I am not allowed to drink on the job, thanks to a
500ml Mountain Dew that looked like a bottle of beer!!

mmaetoius phlegm reicystur

I sat down to finish a very important long winded email and practise
banjo, but...

and there always has to be a but...

I sat on a hard organ stool and tried to figure out what I had done
with regards to enabling .asp and directory indexes...

BUT tomorrow is another day - I wonder what kind of banjo I'd get in
heaven to play??

The weekend and the 'horror show'

I've had the most wicked weekend of my life so far this year..

I'm so eager for Holiday Club and my role in it this year - I'm gonna
be doing something I've never done, but still be in the background
eating grass!!

This morning I woke up at FIVE o'clock!!!
Yes it is true - I had to feed 4 animals before heading off to work.
Two at Karen's place and two at home. Now why would I want to wake up
so early?
Have you experienced traffic and the stress of getting to work on
time? Well I have and I did not want a repeat of last year! So I fed
the dogs, made breakfast, locked up and headed home. I got home at six
and fed the dogs, got dressed - I drove home in my pyjamas!! I even
got to transfer a picture to the office and arrive before anyone..

I sat in the car listening to 103FM, Impact radio. Good thing is that
they have changed since I last had them on in the mornings back when I
went to school.

I had an appointment at 11 that I missed but rescheduled half an hour
later. I also discovered the source of my incredible tooth ache two
weeks back - I got a root canal. It was not as scary as people say it
is, but then I also am not affected by things people do to me. They
used drills that looked as though they were meant for fastening
drywall to wood, and they kept replacing them with slimmer ones.

The only scary thing was the bill, and the quote for a crown...R3k -
If you can offer me a better price, PLEASE let me know!

I had yogi-sip and a small yogurt for lunch that I slurped up with a
straw - My bottom jaw was killed via injected ammo, rendering my mouth
useless for a few hours...! Worst thing was that with me waking up so
way uber early, I started dying at work and eventually left to go home
to sleep for an hour and a bit, round 4h30.

That's my story for today!
Keep brushing, flossing and using a mouthwash everyday,
Malcs

Quite the peculiar day!?!

OK, I just have to let this out of my system!

This morning before I left I said today was peculiar -  indeed, it
turned out to be peculiar..
Coming down Julius Jeppe Street I put my indicator on to turn left.
The car on the other side looked like she was going straight - no
indicators either way. I saw I could go, but as I left the stop
street, that lady turned at the same time. I stopped and she stopped
next to me and had a mouthful of silent words to give me.. It was her
fault for not indicating and I guess she forgot that shouting through
glass, the atmosphere and another pane of glass is utterly useless!?!

The speed limit is between 70km/h and 80km/h along Gen. Louis Botha,
but I got to drive at 40km/h because of some slow-coach driving a new
beamer two cars in front of me, and then also turned into Glenwood
Road! Great thing was that the BM made for the Menlyn area.

After the traffic light and the first circle in Glenwood Road, I came
centimetres from a bumper bashing experience. At the circle near the
top of the highest rise and the first speed bump, the person in front
of me stopped suddenly - it was very wet and I managed to stop only
centimetres away...I laughed it away and kept my distance doubled!

Fifty metres later, at the traffic light, the car in front of me made
movements as though it were to go through the orange light - it
decided to stop quite suddenly for no reason. Again the wet road did
not come to my rescue, but the brakes did and my fateful experience of
aqua-planing [sp?] some years back across from my old church!

A sighted, not blind, pedestrian decided to cross the road without
looking and walk as if the world stood still, for thirty seconds,
while he got to the other side - I wanted to turn right, the car
opposite mine wanted to turn left and the driver on my left needed to
go straight...

Finally, Darren got me to leave the office today by turning off the
lights as he and Johnathan were leaving - Darren called it a great
incentive to get me to leave the office on time!!

The enD!!

Does the dentist NEED me??

If I will be around you and if I start to cry unexpectantly...

..my teeth HURT..

I NEED the dentist!?!
!i should have gone last yeaR

Another lesson...in PHP about parents!?!

I had a bit of a learning about forgetfulness and php includes
tonight. I remember the gallery being called galindex.php, so made
that the default page via .htaccess, then copied the include.index.php
to galindex.php. I wondered why it took beyond ages to load the
gallery..and then I remembered - I had included galindex.php in
include.index.php which was used yesterday as index.php and the old
index.php was renamed to galindex.php.

For the 8% that understood the above, you'd agree with me that that
was a classy first endless-loop I had created!!
I learnt three things:
1. Write down developments for future reference;
2. The parent file can include the parent file that can include the
parent file that includes the parent file which includes the parent
file of the parent file...etc
3. My parents had parents of their own and those parents had parents
too, who also had parents that had parents of their own!?!

Much like me answering a phone call that never existed and handing it
over to another person...
And when the dogs bark, my lights change colour!

Dear neighbours...

I take absolutely NO RESPONSIBILITY for what you see through my window.

Your eyes are protected by the hedge around the garden. If you decide to prune a hole through the wondrous foliage of my hedge in order to see my dogs and one of your friends catches not only a glimpse, but a whole eye-full of me in my natural element, then you my dog-loving neighbour will be at fault.

I refuse to put netting up as I like my view as it is. Without my glasses, I'd rather see green and blue than white and grey.
If you have an issue with this, then please cut your hole in another location.

The ONLY time that I close my curtains is when I know people are walking in my garden. If you have climbed over the wall to fetch the ball, please make a call ("hello?") before passing by my window - so my dogs are allerted to your presense and bark wildly at the new target to slobber...

Have a pleasant day,
Your neighbour

ps. I intend to install motion detectors and pepper-spray dispensers by each new hole I spot

_____________

Goodbye World

PINK, EUROM vs. RANDOM

PINK, EUROM vs. RANDOM

What is it with the colour pink?
Is it that is rhymes with blink?
Mothers say no,
But daughters are wanting more

Why should you even care?
The only time you see the pink
Is when your friends say no to pink

Are men without a womb
Allowed to mix and be a prune?

Did I loose the plot and braai a chop?

and the source of this silly 'poem'?
- my imagination when I pulled my original off the wall
I was going through an EMOtional blackness and didnt really care for much - guess that's why it is not a poem..

PINK

What is it with the colour pink?
Is it that it rhymes with kink?

Mothers say no to pink
But at the ripe age of four
Daughters are all wearing pink.

Why is it not manly for pink to wear men?
The only time guys see the shrink
Is when their friends say no to pink

Are men without a womb
Allowed to mix red and white?

Pink is not peach or even light-red
Pink is pink to the gender of choice.

I can and have written better poetry - I only gave up as I didnt have the time for writing poetry.....

ancillary

so i got bored of just the facebook staring at me, and decided to fool around and click, click, click..
Nothing was correct. it was all just fake-mocking-trash.

as i look down from this table i'm sitting apon, I scratch my neck and notice the empty globe boxes on the floor.they are fitted to the board that is on the stool where i usually sit - my feet are there, complete with uber long nails...

If you haven't noticed by now, i have three long nails on my right hand - I've been playing banjo and learning the finger style!!
I'll miss my nails when i get hold of finger picks - they are great for scraping plaque off my teeth, picking the stuff out my eyes and scratching my ears...and when i least expect it, I find my forefinger up my nose - aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

I start working FULL time from the 6th of April!!
Now i know it is not good to bring work into the home, but when one has to move mail, the best time to do it is at night when both servers dont have as much strain on themselves.
Lynne-uX or Line-uX, I work with Linux and have to think really hard when trouble shooting clients' problems on Windows machines. I try my best not to talk about what I do, because most people don't understand a word I say. Although, IF you HAVE to know, in a nutshell I do the following:

• Take calls
• help people not receiving their mails
• explain that I cant help with sending mails
• help/explain domain related things
• Listen to people...
• Answer tickets relating to
  
• Email
• FTP
• Domains
• Register/Renew/Transfer domains
• Upload/download websites
• Create/modify pg/mySQL databases
• Move things from server A to server B, E or Y
• Use Jabber to communicate with people in the offices
  
• On breaks during the day, I
• get up and do something else
• play around on the computer
• take/make personal calls
• eat
• do something on www.eastside.org.za
• type emails
• etc...

>> to the left of me is a small speaker with a dud dvd disk on top;
>> a lightstand with a harddrive platter hanging from it, instead of a light or two;
>> a LEAK speaker upon a small table, with two texecom boxes, an artist's pallete, wood, audio connectors, a stiffy and an odd cell phone;
>> an old D&T project - a photo-lab cupboard with a monitor box ontop plus another monitor of the box with a monitor inside and on the top of the box there are random bits of audio cable, an art book, pair of builder's gloves and a red duster;
>> then the wall..but between the two, on the floor there are books from my CTI days and a bunch of random stuff;
>> along the wall there is a dummy body in a box, a white table with electronic projects all over it two old speaker cabinets stacked up against the cupboard/shelves and they are full of lots of stuff including a mirrorball motor;
>> along the shelves and cupboards on the floor there is a box with a hat and some instructions for a sound to light kit that I built. next to this is a mirrorball box with an analogue lighting "console" and a multitude of tools and hardware ontop of it;
the door is open;
>> along the wall to my right is a music robot box that i built when music to light kits actually functioned according to the music and not to some strange variable, two computer skeletons stacked upon each other and an opened psu with a missing fan, a strobe light that looks more like a large old yellow torch, two boxes full of computer/sound stuff, an electronic keyboard with HTML and PHP books, some HD240 earphones and a cd on top of it with music on the stand;
>> in the corner to my right is another LEAK speaker upon a small table, with an old 14" LCD screen on top;
>> between the speaker and the keyboard, on the floor is my computer with none other than UBUNTU 8.04;
>> against the wall, after the corner is an old computer desk with boxes of media, a stack of CD players mounted upon a PSU, tools, a buch of old tapes and my warmth generator - the stereo 35W RMS valve amp;
>> on the floor in the middle of the room, there are lots of things, including a fan, empty boxes, a violin case, C++ books, tobacco (800g), power cables a stool with a light board andmy feet resting upon it, air, a chair and art supplies;
>> watch out for the odd tool on the floor next to the carpet by the doorway...

by the way, i did not mention everything!

DUE TO THE BUTT COMMAND, THIS LINE WILL BE THE LAST

The titlE

...

!sIgh?

...

I miss YOFTIG...

Something that I thought was impossible has now become reality.

Being so far from the people that I used to see everyday kinda gets to
me. Sure I have lots of people around me, but they are far from close
brothers. Memories of our brotherhood float around my head while I'm
busy working. People say please which is annoying after hearing no
please for a full year. If you want something other than tea or
choffee to drink, you bring your own or drink water from the water
dispenser in the office. Cups disappear to the kitchen, they dont wait
for you to do something. There's no amp - everyone has earphones on.
There is more freedom for pranks and there's no fear for impacting on
ministry. I dont miss the lack of entertainment or the hot and stuffy
offices, as there is a foos ball table and aircon. I got used to no
dress code and pets in the office. Now there is none of that!!

Ahh, there's more that I miss, but I'm still having as much fun and
they don't jump red lights.....

Here's to the greatest memories of life, FFIG!!!

Mixa

Extra! Extra! Read all about it!

In the land of webdom, the strings of information sat idle in their
kingdoms while packets came in and out to feed the non-binary friends
of data.

Have I got your attention?
How many times do we judge the content of things by reading the
labels, titles, or seeing the graphics, photos, faces, etc.?

I'll let you think on that, while you read some funny things i found
via the web...

On facebook I saw my good friend Bruce write about his needs - I
thought, hey?! Bruce has needs besides the ones he sometimes shares? -
I clicked and read {I picked and ate}
It was funny needs, not the usual needs one finds everyday. They were
googled needs and I had good fun reding his "needs" that I tried it on
myself!

The idea is to google "yr_name needs" and make a note of the top 10
results. So I googled "Malcolm needs" and got bored with the results -
Malcolm Needs is a guy - his name is Malcolm and his surname is Needs.
Next I tried my popular short name, Malcs. "Malcs needs" only got two
results. Finally I tried a name that only a few of my friends call me,
Malc. This got my funny bone laughing so loudly that my elbow
complained to my brain.

These are the top 10 results for "Malc needs" and my comments are
within [square] brackets:
1. Malc needs help !!
2. Malc needs smackers... 2 years ago. [huh? crayons perhaps?]
3. Malc needs to be on the weekly morning slot we all need a ...
[haha, true in a mean way...]
4. Malc needs to have a better game than Vasquez, and we need to
rebound well. [no comment..]
5. Malc needs to get the point. [yes..haha, guess i do]
6. Malc needs Pen Pals [see that? PEN, not email!]
7. Malc needs YOU(r telephone numbers) [do i?]
8. Malc needs to address this as Emily has had no response. [almost
answering my above query...]
9. Malc needs to read up a bit more on the benefits of saturated fats.
[ah ye..so they finally figured i'm not fat?]
10. Malc needs your help ! [indeed i do!]

I made the comment to Bruce that he should try the same using the
Pages from South Africa option.
I did the same, but Malc and Malcs returned nothing, so I used
"Malcolm needs" - not as funny, but fun anyway!
1. Malcolm Needs; Actors alongside
2. (Malcolm Needs); Poseidon Adventure
3. Malcolm needs to attend a funeral in Cape Town and will be away for
a full week. [haven't been to Cape Town in years]
4. Malcolm Needs by Anne Taylor.
5. Malcolm Needs and Starring... [yawn]
6. Malcolm Needs Producer [so I can launch my short filming career]
7. Malcolm Needs Proteus
8. Malcolm Needs Citizen Verdict
9. Malcolm Needs [it's open ended]
10. Malcolm Needs – Enigma Pictures

I needed to spice this up, so went onto the second page:
A. Malcolm Needs Video casette.
B. Malcolm, needs to be opened to see the quality.
C. Malcolm needs to develop self-esteem and confidence to meet the
right woman... [more confidence than self-esteem]

Have your eyes run away from facebook? Those ads on facebook look bad
in my eyes - dumb double images, 4btw.

Lastly, my friendships with people I made while on Ignite last year
are taking strain. I didnt quite realise what it would do to me if I
started working. Sure, I got friendships developing at the office, but
I'm wasted after work hours sometimes. I think it is because I have so
much fun. I do what I really enjoy - hands on technical with linux.
GUI is cool, but text is better..... I don't want my friendships to
disappear, so I've decided to come to youth on Fridays when I can so
that I can maintain friendships and develop new friendships!

Don't judge, period. As christians(disciples of Jesus) we should be
the example setters and refrain from judging books, sites, people,
food, etc. just from first glance.

As I finish these strings of informative characters, I'll dump them
into the idle kingdoms of the world wide web.

Writers' block

.

Banjo stuff and A career change!!

At long last,

I found a reliable stockist of finger and thumb picks. And banjo straps!
I've tried using a strap from my Bible case, but it kept sliding down and I need the banjo up to get my fingers to the correct positions.

Until next week when I go to King Louis Musical Instruments, who are in town and sell any instrument at a great price (012 327 0442/3), I'll keep learning chords and their structure as well as scales!

I've decided to make IT my career. This means my studies stop at Bth - I'm not sure what I want to study. I've got interests in many fields and I'd like to get a degree higher than a diploma - but I'm no academic, I'm a hands on guy. I've got a gift for technical things.

I'd love to be challenged to install something complex from a non-English country where, when they publish manuals in English, they speak more Russian or French than English!

Office 2007 sucks potatoes and stinks like poo

So I'm editing the notices on the website and to get things done quicker, I figure I would rather type without looking at the screen - during the holidays I lost my ability to touch-type...
My Mom calls from the kitchen for me to put the dishes away, so I decide to finish the sentence and press save. I look up and see to my horror that I TYPED EVERYTHING IN UPPER-CASE!! Quick on the thinking blocks, I start up wORD (drop cap intended) and paste the text. After highlighting it I franticly look for the change case option that I normally find under the drop down menus.

^#&@^%@&^$#$@^%#$@^#^$!&@^#*$^*#^@*!*!*@^*!*^@*!^*^@*!*@*&@&!*#^#%^&!%@!!!!!!!!!!!!

Right-clicking didn't work. Although after studying the odd graphical icons, and mouse'ing over, I found the horrid change case button. I got up in a fit and peacefully helped my Mom...

Sure, office 2007 is great for the person who's used it for ever and a day, but for a newbie or someone used to office 2000 or 2003...it sucks potatoes and stinks like poo - even worse, Open Office 3 is far better than office 2007 as it works on older hardware whereas office 2007 dries up every bit of memory and spits out dung.

So now that I have the text changed, I copy and paste it into the editor. But the font is different, so I reveal the source and find a page and a half of worthless markup. So now office has gone from a text document editor to a "I know what you want to do" package that by default copies not only the text, but all the bitters that go with it. but, but, but. No. It shouldn't insert markup like it does. Imagine if for every second paragraph I had to insert it from wORD. The source for my webpage would be multiples of style blocks and other markup, making the final saved page into a huge file. If I used notepad and saved the same file with all the fancy fonts and structure of the page my file would be alot smaller, but it's far more easier to paste text into the editor on the website.

My biggest complaint is the iconified office package that costs a mint, does its own thing and takes longer to learn than Blender or Adobe Premiere!

No, I'm not anti- Windows. I just use linux as I don't own a licensed copy of Windows. I was SUSE, but now I'm Ubuntu. I was KDE, but now Gnome. See where I'm going?
(Terminals kick ass better than GUIs)

Support Open Source, I do and live like a King!

I'm getting rid of my PC for a season!!

Those funny moments in life are the ones that allow us to laugh at ourselves.

I was about to get on an escalator and just before stepping on, I looked down to check when I should put my foot down - I never did put my foot down, the steps seemed to be racing past my foot at lightning speed.
I used the steps instead.

These past few days have been tiring - I stayed up all night/morning to figure out why www.malcsman.za.net/dev didnt work the way I wanted it to, so I kept trying different things. Last night I went to a mens' meeting where I almost fell asleep and then I spoke to this one young guy afterwards to attempt to wake up so I could drive to a pizza place to get some food for supper!

This is the last blog I post from this PC at home.
For those that read this from afar, this is what I have decided apon after the ultimatum from the mens' meeting:

Transfer the data from an old file server onto a disk, as the old file server has a unique fs type unknown to ubuntu. Transform my PC into a file server for Eastside. I have asked my parents to hide the adsl router away from me so that when I'm home alone, or when the computer is not in use, I cannot use the internet. On Friday I'll take the PC to church so I can connect it up to the LAN and hand out usernames and passwords, as well as burning a disk for Catherine.

With no computer usage at home, I'll be able to do more!

I will clear the computer stand and make it a workspace so I can finish making Jaime. Even tho I had just connected my sound, I'll use my mp3 player for music. And I'll put my Bible mp3 disks onto the drive so I can enjoy them too.

To be absolutely honest, I cant wait for the freedom!

Hello Peter, I have a complaint to share.........

Indeed I did and I got quite the response too!

My complaint was about an alarm company that used to send Adult
Kangaroos that could jump over the gate to check if our place was OK
or if the criminals were still inside, but now sent
Mini-Baby-Kangaroos to come check my place out. Two of the MBKs wrote
notes to say "sharp fence" and "devil fork" the other day.

Cute?!?

You should be able to see the difference between MBKs . and AKs | - if
not, ask yourself if baby kangaroos can jump higher than their
mothers. Thought so...

I was beside myself and logged onto hellopeter.com to voice my
complaint last Friday.
This evening I got a call to say that a senior rep. will come visit me
to talk to me. I even got mail to say that they are investigating the
matter. To cut things skew, I was greeted by a sales man to buy a key
lock thing (which can be broken with a hammer) and told I would get a
written report. Neat hey? Thought I'd get an explanation to the MBKs,
not a bad lesson in sales..
I hope that report will explain things.....

ok, that's my rant for today. I'm gonna get to bed 2 hours before I
got to bed last night!!

35W RMS per channel....

I thawt the day would never arrive...

I'm a true old-school young adult who acts like a teen sometimes!
I have an old Kenwood solid state stereo amp that has a faulty final-stage-amp, but a working pre-amp AND a dyNaCO valve power amp!!

Though the only thing now is that this room becomes a furnace...

I did have a bit of a sparky start to brilliant sound though - the transformer had dodgy input connections and I did this when I was in half-awake-sleep mode. I managed to cross the wires and short them, so when I powered up, it went BANG!!!
so ALWAYS fix dodgy looking connections! Lucky for me, I powered down almost immediately and I didnt blow a fuse!

BTW. If I connected direct from the computer, I think I would have mismatched things. I'm not gonna guess the rest, nor did I want to make things blow up - great thing is I can still choose my input with ease!!

Just think, if I get another four speakers and place them around the house, I could host a house party and leave my PC where it is...

OK, I'll stop

In all fairness, I have been naughty

When your elders tell you to stop doing things (A) that make you feel that you need something (B) more, which in turn puts a large trap (C) in your path that you don't see, because of your arogance (D) towards bad things due to the first thing (A) and the way it made you feel. So you get trapped by the trap in the path (C) and the before you are drawn into the whole trap, you realise that you are in the exect same place as you were when you fell from your relationship with God (NOT God's relationship with you). So you look to God for the help you need to get out of the trap.

And then you start to understand a concept of Peter walking and then sinking into the water, asking for Jesus' help and getting rescued immediately.

Being called to be a disciple of Jesus by another disciple of Jesus with the authority to make disciples is an honour only later in life when I have come to understand Jesus' teachings. With this understanding producing a love of knowing and understanding Jesus more and more, just like His first disciple, my love for God has grown. Now I just want to know more than I already know. There is this will inside of me that I can't explain.

Exploring and doing the things I should not do (A) and the things that they bring (B) and eventually place (C) before me, can destroy the strong relationship I have with Jesus. Though because of Jesus' love for me, His relationship with me is never distroyed (except on that day that Jesus returns to earth).

The unfortunate result from exploring things you shouldn't do on a regular basis or even irregular like now and then, is that you start to love these things (B) and the feelings they may bring. It may not be obvious at first, but if you really think about it, you would rather do the things you shouldn't, instead of loving Jesus by doing the things He commands.

I'm not writing about something specific. I'm writing about the many things in this world that we eventually love and do instead of our first love, God. Be it sport, TV games, music, cellphones, sex, computer games, body building, IT, drugs, networking, sexual play, computer software and/or hardware, drinking, internet, coffee, coke, magazines, gym, etc.(A,B) All these can become the something in our lives that destroys our relationship with Jesus.

God doesn't only care about us, the grown-up children and adults, but also the children and babies. We are all, as disciples of Jesus, called to be an example to the children. An example in how to live life and honour God. This requirement is not only for Sundays and the lives of christian children, but for every second of every 24 hour day for the rest of our lives on earth and the lives of every child that sees us (A,B,C).

As I said, I was naughty. I picked something else (B) instead of God the other night. The consequences were grave. When I fell into the trap (C), I didn't realise it at first, but as soon as I figured that I was about to do something that I loved doing instead of the other thing I love, I stopped in my tracks. I thought for a while why I'd want either or both. I chose God. I chose the thing that I love. I asked Jesus to rescue me and He did, immediately. I'm glad that I chose God instead of the activity that I had become addicted to.

If I had chosen my addiction over God, I would have lost all the ground that I had gained in my relationship with God. I would have had to start from the beginning again. I have now removed all contact with the person (and people) who would have taken part in my addiction with me.

Why do I call it my addiction?
I have taken part in this activity so many times that it is now a part of who I am. I can't imagine myself without it, therefore I'm addicted to that activity.

I have a deep desire over this specific activity that I would like to transfer over to God. I can hardly imagine the result of turning every picometer of myself over to God, going bad. I'm sure you've got something in your life that you serve more than God. Have you ever felt this way?

God says that we cannot serve two masters at the same time and be happy with both (Luke 16:12-14). We have to serve one master and one master only. I choose my master to be God.

Who will you choose as your master?

Facebook.......

aahhhh, yes.

The immortal faceBook...Why does something so unsociable become such a
craved resource when one has almost nothing to do?

aaaaaaaaaargh - this is annoying, but I'll try the extra days in
February to see how far I can go

*sigh*

How to feel exposed at work...

Yes, right now I feel very exposed.. But I'm not showing to anybody my feelings...

Anyway, this is just a quick note on how to feel exposed at work:

1. Wake up
2. Drink coffee
3. Shower
4. Dry yourself
5. Put clothes on
6. Eat breakfast
7. Leave the house...
10. ...Arrive at work
11. Work
12. Work
13. Work
14. Smell yourself without lifting your arm
15. Realising you forgot to put deo on.....
16. .....Feel exposed.....

Simple hey??

Cant recall the last time I went bonkers...

Did you know that taking a MONTH long break from facebook was probably
the worst thing I could have done??!!

I have missed events because of this. Events that I would have loved
to attend. This is all doing me good in a mysterious way. And then I
was tagged in a video??? er, what video did I get into? I generally
make a video look bad when I'm in it. Notifications are nice to have,
but they have just enough info there and just too little to give one a
good idea of what's going on, that one wants to login to find out -
something I'm going bonkers about..

It's only half way. Reminds me of what it felt like when I was
quitting smoking - no, I'm not quitting facebook just yet..fear not?!
because this is often the closest I come to old friends and
unfortunately the farthest from social interaction - something I didnt
enjoy for years while behind a computer doing nothing but geeky stuff
without pay.

Now I get paid for being a geek and I am in a social environment where
everyone jokes and pulls pranks with everyone else. Best job I've ever
had!

Now that I've had some lines to blow some chunks, I'll leave you with
a glass of fat-free milk (white coloured water).

Tomorrow is a day when I can't wait to get back to studying! Learning
how God gets things done is such fun. You should try it one day - it
will bless you, no matter what field you're in!

{;o)

eh?

WARNING: Some paragraphs could be crude, depending who reads them...

On Thursday evening we went out for fish at a place called simply fish or something like that. I was not sure which fish dish I was going to try. Looking back, I should have had the Hake. I chose the linefish. It was butterfish. Butterfish is normally dry. This butterfish was soft and it tasted as if, after it was grilled, it had been soaked in thick oil for ten minutes before being served. I felt a bit sick after the second mouthful, but I ate and decided never to have it again - it was disgusting. Try Disgusting for R69...what a bargan!!

Rich, very rich food |-> myASS

So on Friday morning I had a really bad dream - I would normally share, but the image of having wet poo all over a shirt may disturb sensitive readers?!? In bed, I lay on my side and decided to fart in bed and get seven or so minutes more of sleep. I let wind, but after it felt odd I put my hand down there and realised I passed..ok, I won't go there, but I'm thankful I didn't have to wash my sheets. I ran to the loo twice after that, went for my shower and after five seconds I hit the water lever and sat down to pass another slime ball or three.

I got to work thirty minutes after I had wanted to be there, which meant I had to leave thirty minutes later. Instead of coming in to sit down at Andrew's desk (Andrew is on leave till Monday), I ran off to the loo. I came back and worked on creating new email addresses, out of office replies and deleting the junk mail in the support ticket system. I was thirsty, so I went to get myself some water - I clean forgot to get the cool water from the water dispenser. Good thing that I didn't as I had to perform an emergency stop and get myself sitting down as soon as was impossible!! After that, I must have visited the loo another six or seven times.

I learnt how to move data from a local database to an online database. Ok, I knew how to do that, but I didn't know the paths to get to the databases nor the username and password to use. phpPgAdmin has the same sort of feel as phpMyAdmin - I come from a mySQL past. The last time I tried postgres, I broke something and spent hours converting the dump into something that mySQL would understand. ie, I only know how mySQL and phpMyAdmin works.

Andrew, if you read this, type the first few letters of the name of the server you want to connect to and press TAB - I got too lazy to type ssh root@whatever all the time, so I made some scripts...see you Monday morning!! as if he'd read this...hahahaaa??!

I'd love to have access to the money I earn, on a daily basis and not on a 32 day basis. I therefore needed to give Inge my account number, but I had no idea what it could be. I lost the paper that had my account numbers on, so I went to the bank to get the two account numbers. The rain was going to be too much for me to handle, so I parked right at the doorstep to FNB Menlyn Square. I figured three rand was not much to pay. The bank was not busy, but after seeing three people I had been there an hour. My bottom-end was about to explode into a sticky, gooey, stinky mess... I expected to pay more than three rand as the three rand only covered thirty minutes. When I went out, I saw I needed to pay six rand for being parked for an hour, but I had to pay eight rand. I asked how long I had been and the teller said one hour and six minutes...why I had to pay an extra two rand for being inside for six minutes, I don't know?! But the teller said it with much pride - or as though she couldn't care less..

Due to my explosive rear-end, I decided not to go for a banjo lesson nor go to a party that was held for Simon who recently returned from America. After eight in the evening, it was like the liquid became ice. After nine, the ice became dry-steam and then disappeared completely after ten.

I got the box-set of the Gummi Bears series. This evening I watched two DVDs. I enjoyed that. I'm only on volume 4, so I'm only, just, half way! Great thing is that I can watch my favourite shows while babysitting. I'm babysitting on the seventeenth this month - don't want to be nasty or anything, but I do hope Jordan has not learnt how to take more than three steps by himself..he's a lot more slower if he crawls!?!

If I'm near you, please refrain from telling someone so that the whole world hears about the latest in the [mini] world of Facebook - it may cause me to stay off it till the end of February and then I won't come to any of the events that I've been invited to...

Shout-out to Nicholas!! The Nicholas from Eastside Youth, ofc..

I love my job and my work...

FYI - I'm off faceBook for the month of January.

This week I have been the only support person in the office and I
basically got thrown into the deep-end of Linux support.

It was VERY scary when I sat down and FORGOT what command to use while
sitting with my boss..er, I blamed the holidays!?!
I'm now at home with all the commands that I need to use. It only took a
couple of calls and a few many tickets to process, to get my head around
the forgotten.

I'm so pleased with myself - I managed without the usual guys that I lean
on regarding linux support!

Between support and going through a linux training manual, I get requests
from people in the office for either help, or things to do. I don't mind
at all - I used to sit up late or early into the mornings messing around
on shells, IRC and my linux box. So this is the perfect job for me!!

Hence I love my job and my work!!

A life lesson I learnt

I remember my Matric Dance as something that I regretted later that night.

1. I was too kind in swapping tables with someone who sounded desperate.
   
2. I tried to be someone that I wasn't, but when that failed,
3. I didn't want to dance because of that shame, brought about by people I wanted to call friends.

I really regret not dancing...I could have broken out of my shell - the shell that became iron cause I listened to what others said about me.

Good thing about all this is that that taught me a valueable lesson - don't judge yourself by what others say about you, be yourself. If you don't know who yourself is, then trust God to guide you through life so you can discover yourself.

I see the beginings of an army...

There is a revival brewing in South Africa and I can see it, hear it and feel it.

If you think I'm mad or psycho, I am. There's been lots to prove to me that God is coming through His people in a mighty way.
My friends are recognising their gifts and they are using them for God's glory.
They are even going so far as growing them, so that they can do more and more and more!!

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" <-- Not for my friends, they are showing others the beauty and not keeping it for themselves.

I make a stand for God.

God is all powerful. God is also beauty and the object of my faith.
The wonder in it all is that whenever you think you know who God really is, you discover more and more about God.

God, the God that sent Jesus Christ (as we all affectionately call him) is the father of sons and daughters who willl inherrit everything that Jesus spoke of and more!

Internet, sin and trance...

There's a black dog at my feet that goes by the name, Peppa. My foot is becoming warm.

I read a website that said that its okay to go thru what I know most guys are going thru, as the Bible does not mention it at all.
No, I didn't think you'd get it. I have been getting a deep rooted feeling inside everytime I come across people, institutions or websites that stress being a christian gives you the right to sin even more than before. I have learnt that what you read on the internet is not always trustworthy, but that's not the point. Most of my generation and the younger generations feed off the internet and these sort of websites are not good for the new christian, no matter what background.

Back when I was working in a tuckshop, I was nailed for posting a very silly study on the notice board. It was silly because what I was really trying to do was to find comfort in those around me in the same position. I can only imagine the friendships I lost out on because of that post. I could have spoken more to the patrons I saw everyday.

Why was it silly??
It was silly to put it up because it came from a website.
I was addicted to the food that was offered on the web. I would sit up till late at night and feed off loads of information on the web.
In those days, there was more false information than true. Today I'd still say the same. It is so easy to make a website about nothing and portray it as something grand. Perhaps it could be said that there is far more information these days that is neither false nor true. Scary, but the fact remains that as more and more people obtain access to the internet and produce information for others to find, the internet is becoming like a paperless-junkie's haven. If publishing a book was as easy as publishing things on the internet, we'd have more books than we'd know what to do with.

I could go on, but I don't feel like ranting to be honest. I have Johan Nilsson's mixes playing in my ears. You may not enjoy them as much as friends of mine enjoy hardcore metal, but I have gone through another shift in my tastes of music in the realm of dance and trance.

The year I finished school, I managed to go to a night club that played hardcore trance and dance, depending on which dancefloor you went to. I loved that music 5 minutes into the first set. It got me going. It energised me beyond energy drinks.
This kind of music went TOTALLY against my parents' taste. You see, I grew up on classical music - in school I loved it so much, that for every project that involved some aspect of music, I'd use "hardcore" classical music. I'm grateful for my parents. If they did not get me hooked on classical, I would never have learnt what music is all about. In school I hated metal, although I put up with it, I really didn't like it at all. For me, trance encompasses all the complexities found in classical music. Although not all the tracks have the same complex sound, most of them come close! I have sifted through so many mixes to find the rare jewels.

As my ignite year went along, I started to enjoy listening to metal. One thing I don't understand is the love some people have of bands that scream a mumble. Screaming is fine to the degree of understanding what it is that is being said. By the end of the year, I was enjoying synths and emotion in a track, rather than the rythym created by drums.
Funny thing really, I have been away from metal for longer than a week. I'm now back into the world of trance, but the trance can't have overpowering drums in it - that just ruins everything!

The popular trance in my opinion is not worth listening to, except a few - I haven't been to a music store to buy trance in a long time. I use the internet. It does take time to sift through music to find the diamonds among the resin, but once you have found something, it is so worth it!
I generally use, http://www.bangingtunes.com. It's not the only one, I'm sure I have used others in the past - my computer with all my bookmarks died some time ago..therefore I have to find the sites again.....

I had a friend that would judge a piece of music by listening to the first few seconds and then keep skipping every 40 seconds or so to determine if it was good or not. I dont do that. I download one piece, listen to it and then decide weather or not to download more. Right now, I'm listening to a 65 minute trance mix - I'm on 26 minutes..great stuff!!
Aah, a whole bunch of synths playing melody, rhythm and beat without drums - love that and the effect it brings. I wouldn't say I go into a trance, but it takes me into a total relaxed state!

Mixes HAVE to be free of sex for me to really enjoy them. A simple sentence like, "from the air to the brain", is far better than mainstream mixes which use sexually inducing words in their sentences.
In case you are wondering, a mix contains several tracks (songs) mixed seamlessly to form a mix. A track that continues for 60 minutes would bore me after 10 minutes...

I'm missing being in the office all day. I really want to finish Jaime and perhaps give him a better name - can't wait to go to a shop to dress him....Imagine what people would think..hehehehee.

I'm falling asleep

My GREATEST news for a long time to come!!

Ahh, what a good feeling to be behind a computer running STUDIOubuntu and a keyboard that I can type on, almost without looking at the keys!

here, look!
"A complete line typed without looking at the keyboard!!!" - "I looked at the LCD screen, all the time while typing"

HONEST, though I did make the few mistakes along the way and was very tempted at looking down!
working in IT support using a console and a web interface all day (half days mind you) kinda helps me get a faster typing rate.

It is sad, but uber satisfying that I have completed a year of service at Eastside Community Church. Absolutely BRILLIANT!! All that is left is to complete the edit of my ffig episode - was kinda thinking of backtracking on my last statement of saying i'm not an editor..maybe i'll give someone the raw footage and the final production, i dont know.

Summer Camp this year was an absolute blast! I met so many new friends and gave me the confidence I needed to retain my life in Christ. To be honest, it hasnt been all that great this last 27 hours. I have been thinking bad things and looking and doing kompletely DUMNB things.. (i know i missspelt, but it's for emphasis!)

This morning my Mom woke me up with coffee and a request for me to take a shower before she showed me something. Unfortunately I took extra long in the shower - dry sun burnt shoulders from the Ignite outing were soothed by being blasted by a cool stream of water..if only we had one of those pulsating shower heads. Then my Dad asked me to eat breakfast before he showed me.. I decided to have my all-time favourite, Pro-Nutro!! It went hard as I got distracted, and at ten, I put more milk in and decided to log onto facebook while I finish the last few mouthfuls of breakfast. So glad I had the threat of a session on Summer Camp to get me to eat fast this last week!
So I power up the router, walk down the passage, open the door, switch the light on - the room is dark as the curtains are always closed when no one is inside the room.

I cant say what my reaction was, but I guess it was a bit of disbelief. Lying on the organ bench (keyboard seat/computer seat) was a black banjo bag. My Mom and Dad were going to show me, so I picked it up off the seat and gently put it on the floor - trust me, there is no other space anywhere else. I started up the computer and logged into facebook.

When my Dad walked in, he explained the banjo and he got a big fat hug from me because of that! I'm gonna get a banjo lesson of one hour soon -- gotta make a date, and then I'll join a banjo club every Friday night. Sometimes I'll visit u*th and / or CoolBeans, dont you be so sad..!

When my Mom came home I gave her a big bear hug too! Ahh, Finally I get a banjo to play on!
I found a tutorial on the net and will be giving it a tune and a pluck very shortly. In a few months, the worship band will never be the same... hehe

It's good fun when as a smoke screen before writing this blog I told Bruce that I did get a new violin - a violin made from pure white granite.... Imagine playing that!?! Hope he didnt believe me...

I'll be changing the name of this blog sometime soon, but the address will stay the same, as I love the added meaning to it: http://ignitemalcs.blogspot.com

www.malcsman.za.net will still be the main link to it, as well as Facebook getting updates from it.

Thank you to all my readers for bearing with me as I blogged and blogged about my year of Ignite!
I had an absolute blast!!

Insomnia

So it is true, the common side effect of insomnia and drowsiness / yawning is well, happening to me!?!

I decided to watch movies on SABC3 and the ones i saw were Fallen II and Final Destination.

Fallen II was as much as fiction as science fiction - though it would be cool to be a Nephilim!

Final Destination was tunips!
Was about Alex who cheats death and saves another 7, but there's a pattern that eventually kills 5 of the 6 survivors. Although it is not that funny in the sense of death, but the whole concept and the way this death makes things happen is really funny. Kinda like the water that seeps back into the toilet to make it look like a suicide, and then the most dumbest - don't touch the murder weapon scene, Alex touches the knife...

The final scene before the credits come up is a priceless one. Alex saves himself, Ali saves Alex, Carter saves Alex and THEN.....
Carter asks who's next...a billboard falls in his direction and just before impact, it cuts to the credits!
Funny: Alex Chance Browning .... get it?

And now another film has caught my eye, something about some strange virus that destroys a person within hours.

ok, so it has been almost an hour and i'm still here..

Gmail is turnips! it has themes!!
they are really turnip.
AHH, brilliant!! The Terminal theme. so old school.
its 3h38am and i just remembered what Bruce asked me to do before 17h00... lemme do it now...

and then firefox crashed - if i were on facebook, this message would have erased itself. never to get into the gist of going into the history books..

so its 04h19 and that movie, i could have guessed the outcome, but hey, i didnt spoil the point in watching it. Gmail gone green, kinda reminds me of those good old terminals that had green instead of white and black screens - those were good times.

i worked on a supa fast machine, a 286, or maybe pre-286. i dont know how to tell..
all it needed was the default values loaded into the cmos - the cmos battery pack was replaced, so it cleared the cmos!

4h41am
i've done everything i can think of. havent even thought of the things i'd normally have thought of in this situation.

I'm hungry
SMiLE

Public speaking.....

On Monday I was asked if I would be able or rather willing to help out with chapel on Tuesday morning. I was told that if I decide to help, I must come to a planning evening at Mugg & Bean, Woodlands @ 18h30.

I thought long and hard about it and decided to help.

I got to the meeting 30 minutes late, but I told Jean that I would be late.

I ordered my usual large strawberry milkshake and then we got down to business.

I didn’t know how to give input, so I just sat there. But then Jean said something about idols and a thought stirred up inside my head.

‘What if, when you are speaking about idols, someone takes out their cell phone and plays with it?’

I started something. Mel piped up about a testimony and Jean asked if any of us, Jean, Anthony, Mel and myself, had a testimony to share.

I immediately thought about IRC. My face, without authorization, gave a smile and, on direct orders not to, my head nodded.

‘Oh crap! What have you go yourself into now?’

When I got home, I had supper and sat down to start writing my testimony. After 2 – 3 hours and lots of scrap paper, I had a 3½ page testimony.

On Tuesday morning I had no nervous feelings. I got to church and timed myself reading the text – it rook me around 6 minutes.

When we arrived, I learnt where we would be giving the chapel period.

And then I realized how many people would come!

Nerves started flowing, but I kept breathing.

I was introduced and I got up to get the mike from Mel.

I read the first line on my script and um, stopped for 15 seconds. . .

I couldn’t believe I was standing in front of around 200 school children and giving a speech!
I don’t do such things. Period. I’m the supa-quiet ignite guy.

I gave a testimony on idols. My idols were IRC, MXIT and facebook. I tried to be as blunt as possible.

When the wind blew my notes, I cracked a joke about it. I’m thankful for my Mom sending me to Toastmasters for a year or two!

I was told that I was brilliant. I got cheered on by the students. I was simply shocked that I managed to keep myself sane in front of many school children.

Now, before I take all the glory, God was the biggest player in all this. Without God, I would have been quite useless.

I had fun today. I spoke to lots of people.

One last thing. I said I was almost a week without facebook. That word slipped out. What I meant to say was my home pc. I’ll try not to go onto facebook as much as I used to with a personal computer in my room. Once a week tho!?

Blessed be the name of the Lord!!!!!