Posts
Have you watched the heartburn remedy adverts on (South African) TV with the morphing firemen? There’s one version where a pregnant woman, who appears to be in some discomfort, is asking an equally pregnant pharmacist for something to relieve heartburn.
After expounding the merits of the featured remedy for some time to the suffering woman, including how safe it is to use during pregancy, the pharmacist finally produces a bottle of the stuff. The stoic customer, who seems on the verge of collapse at any second, then gratefully swallows a spoonful of it.
The scene cuts to somewhere inside of her, where a little white fireman is hard at it with his hose, spraying her innards with the miraculous white liquid, while his buddies stand by to assist...
Could neither of these women figure out that having little white guys ferretting around inside them with their hoses is probably what led to the whole damn mess in the first place?
The final, ‘seminal’ image in the ad is of the (presumably sated) fireman waving his oversized hose at a suggestive angle, as a large drop of white liquid exudes from it in a distinctly biological way – quite different from what one would expect from a high pressure firehose.
Having penned these weighty thoughts, I wondered if it was just me, or did anyone else read this ad the way I did. After Googling the name of the remedy together with the word ‘fireman’ I was relieved to find that I’m not alone – though disappointed not to be quite as ahead of the curve as I first imagined. Other ads featuring the lucky lads are the subject of these articles, but the gist remains the same.
Verdict – either the copywriter urgently needs to get laid before his/her next brief, or is a genius of Freudian proportions.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Trimming the sails
This weekend, I’ve concentrated on adding a few features to this new blog, after taking a fresh look at what far more experienced bloggers than I are doing out there. I’m blogging about these to help fellow newcomers out there – maybe even elicit some helpful advice from other bloggers. I’ve also listed some helpful resources at the bottom of this post.
Picasa Web Albums. I added a collection of photos of our glorious cat Stinker into a free online photo album on Picasa. This now runs as a thumbnail-sized slide show in the left hand column of The Good Ship Venus. Picasa has many great features that I will enjoy tinkering with, and provides 1GB of free storage.
Afrigator. I added my blog to Afrigator, a ‘social media aggregator and directory built especially for African digital citizens who publish and consume content on the Web'. See the logo on the left hand column. This is a great way of locating African blogs, and of letting people know about your little stake in the blogosphere. It also provides statistics on traffic to your blog. Immediately on signing (for free), my blog appeared in their listing of new blogs on their home page.
Subscribe button. I added a ‘subscribe’ feature to make it easier for people to follow the blog (working on the assumption that someone is actually reading it).
Updated my Profile. I added several blogs onto my ‘Blogs I Follow’ list, more books that I have enjoyed reading, and some more personal interests. These can be found on my 'View My Complete Profile link'. By clicking on say, ‘Merry Christmas Mister Lawrence’, I can see who else in the Blogger world rates this fairly obscure movie (436 people). Click on ‘cats’ and you get 391,000 people’s profiles. Interestingly, ‘female nudes’ only generates four profiles including mine, and two of these are women’s...
Webmaster tools. Google provides some tools to help ensure your blog has some chance of being noticed, and does not contain errors that prevent search bots from locating you. This is a user item and is not visible on the blog.
Gmail. I’ve added an email address for people to be able to contact me off-blog without cluttering my work or private email. Using Google’s free Gmail service I created an online email account. Find this on the ‘View My Complete Profile’ page: see ‘contact’.
Other bits and bobs. Google has a useful interface called a Google Account. By signing on to my account all Google affiliated products that I use can be accessed simply, using a single password. From my account I access my Gmail, Google Reader (creates my very own aggregated magazine composed of new articles posted by the 60 or so feed-enabled websites and blogs that I try to keep up with, Webmaster Tools, Blogger, i-Google (a customizable webpage), YouTube, Picasa and even a very useful online Calendar (this will even email you to remind you about your anniversary, meeting etc. An instant messaging chat service called Google Talk and a document storage and viewing repository called Google documents add even more functionality.
Recommended Offline Reading (you know, actual books)
• The Rough Guide to Blogging, by Jonathan Yang. Penguin Books Ltd. 2006
• The Bookaholic’s Guide to Book Blogs, compiled by Rebecca Gillieron and Catheryn Kilgarriff. Marion Boyars Publishers Ltd. 2007
Recommended Online Reading
Blogging Pro
Daily Blog Tips
Copyblogger
Bloggerhelp on YouTube (good video tutorials for new Bloggers)
Picasa Web Albums. I added a collection of photos of our glorious cat Stinker into a free online photo album on Picasa. This now runs as a thumbnail-sized slide show in the left hand column of The Good Ship Venus. Picasa has many great features that I will enjoy tinkering with, and provides 1GB of free storage.
Afrigator. I added my blog to Afrigator, a ‘social media aggregator and directory built especially for African digital citizens who publish and consume content on the Web'. See the logo on the left hand column. This is a great way of locating African blogs, and of letting people know about your little stake in the blogosphere. It also provides statistics on traffic to your blog. Immediately on signing (for free), my blog appeared in their listing of new blogs on their home page.
Subscribe button. I added a ‘subscribe’ feature to make it easier for people to follow the blog (working on the assumption that someone is actually reading it).
Updated my Profile. I added several blogs onto my ‘Blogs I Follow’ list, more books that I have enjoyed reading, and some more personal interests. These can be found on my 'View My Complete Profile link'. By clicking on say, ‘Merry Christmas Mister Lawrence’, I can see who else in the Blogger world rates this fairly obscure movie (436 people). Click on ‘cats’ and you get 391,000 people’s profiles. Interestingly, ‘female nudes’ only generates four profiles including mine, and two of these are women’s...
Webmaster tools. Google provides some tools to help ensure your blog has some chance of being noticed, and does not contain errors that prevent search bots from locating you. This is a user item and is not visible on the blog.
Gmail. I’ve added an email address for people to be able to contact me off-blog without cluttering my work or private email. Using Google’s free Gmail service I created an online email account. Find this on the ‘View My Complete Profile’ page: see ‘contact’.
Other bits and bobs. Google has a useful interface called a Google Account. By signing on to my account all Google affiliated products that I use can be accessed simply, using a single password. From my account I access my Gmail, Google Reader (creates my very own aggregated magazine composed of new articles posted by the 60 or so feed-enabled websites and blogs that I try to keep up with, Webmaster Tools, Blogger, i-Google (a customizable webpage), YouTube, Picasa and even a very useful online Calendar (this will even email you to remind you about your anniversary, meeting etc. An instant messaging chat service called Google Talk and a document storage and viewing repository called Google documents add even more functionality.
Recommended Offline Reading (you know, actual books)
• The Rough Guide to Blogging, by Jonathan Yang. Penguin Books Ltd. 2006
• The Bookaholic’s Guide to Book Blogs, compiled by Rebecca Gillieron and Catheryn Kilgarriff. Marion Boyars Publishers Ltd. 2007
Recommended Online Reading
Blogging Pro
Daily Blog Tips
Copyblogger
Bloggerhelp on YouTube (good video tutorials for new Bloggers)
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Amberguity
I've just been doodling in PowerPoint. Used part of an anatomical study by da Vinci dated between 1509 and 1514, and part of a 2005 Hubble Telescope image of cold hydrogen clouds in the Carina nebula. My own words and attempt to draw a piece of amber added.
Great sites to visit:
HubbleSite - spectacular space images, info and more.
The Web Gallery of Art - virtual art museum of European art from 1100 to 1850 CE. Even has a selection of classical music you can listen to during your visit!
Martialling my thoughts
One of my great interests is reading about aspects of warfare. Military history and strategy, the philosophy of war, and the experience and conduct of the combatants themselves have much to teach us about the nature of people, ethics and business.
Asian books on military strategy and the waging of war, such as Sun Tzu’s Art of War, or Miyamoto Musashi’s The Book of Five Rings, which centres mainly on honing the skills and strategy of individual warriors and developing a warrior-ethic and psyche, are also of keen interest to me due to the influence of Taoism on their authors.
The Art of War was written well over 2,000 years ago in China, and
The Book of Five Rings was written in the 1600’s in Japan, but there is a common thread between the two due to the influence of the Way on their thinking. For Sun-Tzu, the ultimate art of war is obtaining victory without going to war itself, and Musashi writes about developing an implacable, unwavering directness of action, whilst still remaining able to assess and adapt to rapidly changing conditions by cultivating an ‘empty’ mind.
Though many translations and adaptations exist today, I have come to view the most rewarding and helpful translators to be Thomas Cleary and William Scott Wilson, who both have great insights to offer both from their particular translations and interpretations as well as from the comprehensive introductions they make. Due to the pregnant meaning contained in the characters used to write the original Chinese and Japanese texts, there is no such thing as definitive interpretations of either of these works, making it enjoyable to also read other interpretations too.
A word of caution: don’t approach these books by skimming through them to search for independent powerful quotes or sayings. If you do, not only will you lose much of the value that they contain; you can easily trivialise what you read or entirely miss concepts which are only apparent over a number of paragraphs. This, sadly, is the frequent treatment of The Art of War, due to its popularized reputation of being a powerful business tool. Read these books for their own sake, as instructions in the Way of war, and read them start to finish.
In the Water Chapter of The Book of Five Rings, Musashi himself points out: ‘This Way is, in all regards, difficult to write about in detail with the mind just as it is. But even if the words do not seem to connect, you should be able to perceive its principles naturally. You should deeply consider what is written in this book, word by word, character by character. If you think about it indifferently, you are likely to diverge from the Way many times.’ 1
Having read and re-read these books, I find them to be valuable well-springs from which I am able to draw inspiration for developing effective marketing campaigns, tactics for overcoming problems and obstacles, and for perceiving many overlooked opportunities.
References
1 Kodansha International: The Book of Five Rings published 2008, Miyamoto Musashi, translated by William Scott Wilson
Image from Wikipedia: Miyamoto Musashi in his prime. Scanned from Japanese manuscript.
Asian books on military strategy and the waging of war, such as Sun Tzu’s Art of War, or Miyamoto Musashi’s The Book of Five Rings, which centres mainly on honing the skills and strategy of individual warriors and developing a warrior-ethic and psyche, are also of keen interest to me due to the influence of Taoism on their authors.
The Art of War was written well over 2,000 years ago in China, and
The Book of Five Rings was written in the 1600’s in Japan, but there is a common thread between the two due to the influence of the Way on their thinking. For Sun-Tzu, the ultimate art of war is obtaining victory without going to war itself, and Musashi writes about developing an implacable, unwavering directness of action, whilst still remaining able to assess and adapt to rapidly changing conditions by cultivating an ‘empty’ mind.
Though many translations and adaptations exist today, I have come to view the most rewarding and helpful translators to be Thomas Cleary and William Scott Wilson, who both have great insights to offer both from their particular translations and interpretations as well as from the comprehensive introductions they make. Due to the pregnant meaning contained in the characters used to write the original Chinese and Japanese texts, there is no such thing as definitive interpretations of either of these works, making it enjoyable to also read other interpretations too.
A word of caution: don’t approach these books by skimming through them to search for independent powerful quotes or sayings. If you do, not only will you lose much of the value that they contain; you can easily trivialise what you read or entirely miss concepts which are only apparent over a number of paragraphs. This, sadly, is the frequent treatment of The Art of War, due to its popularized reputation of being a powerful business tool. Read these books for their own sake, as instructions in the Way of war, and read them start to finish.
In the Water Chapter of The Book of Five Rings, Musashi himself points out: ‘This Way is, in all regards, difficult to write about in detail with the mind just as it is. But even if the words do not seem to connect, you should be able to perceive its principles naturally. You should deeply consider what is written in this book, word by word, character by character. If you think about it indifferently, you are likely to diverge from the Way many times.’ 1
Having read and re-read these books, I find them to be valuable well-springs from which I am able to draw inspiration for developing effective marketing campaigns, tactics for overcoming problems and obstacles, and for perceiving many overlooked opportunities.
References
1 Kodansha International: The Book of Five Rings published 2008, Miyamoto Musashi, translated by William Scott Wilson
Image from Wikipedia: Miyamoto Musashi in his prime. Scanned from Japanese manuscript.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Rasterbation gives me that warm fuzzy feeling
One thing that I have a love-hate relationship with is software that has about a billion options, gizmos and features that require virtual monastic retreat to study and perhaps if you are worthy, eventually master.
OK, I’m from a generation where your new toaster didn’t come with an instruction manual – you put bread in it and out popped toast... unlike the over-teched modern one smugly lurking in our kitchen, with its three LED lights, three buttons, and a switch with five settings. Thankfully the good old lever is still there, though I’m kind of surprised that it hasn’t been replaced with a front-loading electronic option – seeing the bread disappearing CD-ROM style into the infernal device would be pretty cool I must admit, (as long as you use a recognizable bread format.)
That may explain why I’m really impressed with a little web-gem that I first saw mentioned in a pithy, lateral thinker’s marketing newsletter called Damn I Wish I’d Thought of That! by Andy Sernovitz, CEO of GasPedal.
The Rasterbator is a great freely-downloadable application that allows you to create rasterized versions of images from your PC or the web. It subsequently converts the image into multiple A4-sized (or custom-sized) segments in PDF format, which can then be printed.
Allow me to start over: this is a cool, free programme that allows you to make giant posters from image files that you can print on an ordinary A4 printer (some assembly required.) According to the website these can be up to 20 metres in size (the ones I’ve made so far are about 2 metres wide.)
An amazingly easy to use programme, The Rasterbator will have you rasterbating your sweaty little palms off in seconds, and has a few nifty, equally simple to use options. It can be found on a whacky, possibly Finnish website, The Sect of Homokaasu. There is also a great gallery of rasterbated images submitted by fans of the programme.
The website is also the host of The Kill Everyone Project, which had as its noble goal, the virtual killing of all human beings, one click at a time. According to the TKEP page, the project was completed on 26th of April 2007, taking 2179 days (about six years) of mouse-clicking a button simply called ‘Click here!’ Apart from my long-held suspicions being confirmed that I have been virtually dead since at least 2007, I’m also pretty taken by the ease of use of this errr... killer-app.
Right, it’s time to enter meatspace once more, as I’m flying to Durban really early tomorrow morning to talk to booksellers - back on Friday.
OK, I’m from a generation where your new toaster didn’t come with an instruction manual – you put bread in it and out popped toast... unlike the over-teched modern one smugly lurking in our kitchen, with its three LED lights, three buttons, and a switch with five settings. Thankfully the good old lever is still there, though I’m kind of surprised that it hasn’t been replaced with a front-loading electronic option – seeing the bread disappearing CD-ROM style into the infernal device would be pretty cool I must admit, (as long as you use a recognizable bread format.)
That may explain why I’m really impressed with a little web-gem that I first saw mentioned in a pithy, lateral thinker’s marketing newsletter called Damn I Wish I’d Thought of That! by Andy Sernovitz, CEO of GasPedal.
The Rasterbator is a great freely-downloadable application that allows you to create rasterized versions of images from your PC or the web. It subsequently converts the image into multiple A4-sized (or custom-sized) segments in PDF format, which can then be printed.
Allow me to start over: this is a cool, free programme that allows you to make giant posters from image files that you can print on an ordinary A4 printer (some assembly required.) According to the website these can be up to 20 metres in size (the ones I’ve made so far are about 2 metres wide.)
An amazingly easy to use programme, The Rasterbator will have you rasterbating your sweaty little palms off in seconds, and has a few nifty, equally simple to use options. It can be found on a whacky, possibly Finnish website, The Sect of Homokaasu. There is also a great gallery of rasterbated images submitted by fans of the programme.
The website is also the host of The Kill Everyone Project, which had as its noble goal, the virtual killing of all human beings, one click at a time. According to the TKEP page, the project was completed on 26th of April 2007, taking 2179 days (about six years) of mouse-clicking a button simply called ‘Click here!’ Apart from my long-held suspicions being confirmed that I have been virtually dead since at least 2007, I’m also pretty taken by the ease of use of this errr... killer-app.
Right, it’s time to enter meatspace once more, as I’m flying to Durban really early tomorrow morning to talk to booksellers - back on Friday.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
If you are feeling down, jump!
About five years ago, I finally lost the fight to keep an insurance brokerage business that I had started going. The final nails in the coffin were a devastating burglary and a motorbike accident that happened almost at the same time. In the process, my wife and I lost everything - except for a few suitcases of clothes that is. For a long time afterwards, I felt paralysed by despair and a sense of failure.
Slowly, very slowly, I began to look at my old life and began to wonder, how the hell did I end up in financial services anyway? I'd always wanted to be a writer, journalist, entrepreneur - never a banker or insurance salesman! What a waste of years I thought, I've blown my chances and there's no going back.
After close to a year of unemployment, my wife found work in a publisher, and every now and then was able to swing some freelance work my way. Another year passed, and I was getting work from two publishers and a freelancer. Dull, monotonous stuff it was, called datacapture, which is essentially retyping manuscripts into a format for typesetters to use to lay out text, as well as much more interesting, but infrequent PowerPoint presentations for book fairs and exhibitions. Though it gave me back a sense of self-worth to be at least partially economically active, I still saw little by way of a future for myself.
At this point, a friend of ours invited us to go with her and her young daughter to Knysna, which is situated on the scenic Garden Route in the southern Cape. Along the way we passed Gouritz Bridge, a metal span bridge some 68 metres above the Gouritz river. I noticed there was a bungee platform on the bridge.
Though I'd never wanted to do it before, something inside me told me I had to jump, I must jump, this act of calculated insanity will teach me something, and allow me to release something (other than my bladder). Somehow, I convinced my wife that I must do this thing, and she, who is dreadfully afraid of heights actually accompanied me onto the bridge, ashen-faced, along with our friend and anxious daughter.
The moment, I call it the Zen moment, is when you are buckled up and standing on the edge, with your hands behind your back holding the railings hard enough to crack bone, and you then have to will your hands to let go and put your arms straight out on either side of you, before leaping off the edge towards what seems certain death.
It is the moment that all other fears, doubts and perceived inadequacies are at once crystallised and condensed into a tiny, insignificant point. You see them all, even those that you hadn't even been able to acknowledge before, and you see that they are puny things in comparison to The Fear that is confronting you. In a strange, ironical way, you realise that if you don't face The Fear, all those lesser fears will regain their significance and perhaps have even more power and control over you in the future.
So I jumped...
Two months ago, I jumped again - this time off a 100m cliff in Zambia, near Vic Falls. I jumped to celebrate that first leap into the abyss, the one that I haven't completely landed from yet.
You see, my inner strength came coursing back in the skies above the Gouritz, I realised that I can overcome anything - especially self-imposed limitations. More importantly even than this, I regained the belief that I can achieve anything that I set my mind to as well. Within a year of that first leap, I started working full-time in publishing; doing work that I completely love together with a group of highly dedicated, professional people.
Slowly, very slowly, I began to look at my old life and began to wonder, how the hell did I end up in financial services anyway? I'd always wanted to be a writer, journalist, entrepreneur - never a banker or insurance salesman! What a waste of years I thought, I've blown my chances and there's no going back.
After close to a year of unemployment, my wife found work in a publisher, and every now and then was able to swing some freelance work my way. Another year passed, and I was getting work from two publishers and a freelancer. Dull, monotonous stuff it was, called datacapture, which is essentially retyping manuscripts into a format for typesetters to use to lay out text, as well as much more interesting, but infrequent PowerPoint presentations for book fairs and exhibitions. Though it gave me back a sense of self-worth to be at least partially economically active, I still saw little by way of a future for myself.
At this point, a friend of ours invited us to go with her and her young daughter to Knysna, which is situated on the scenic Garden Route in the southern Cape. Along the way we passed Gouritz Bridge, a metal span bridge some 68 metres above the Gouritz river. I noticed there was a bungee platform on the bridge.
Though I'd never wanted to do it before, something inside me told me I had to jump, I must jump, this act of calculated insanity will teach me something, and allow me to release something (other than my bladder). Somehow, I convinced my wife that I must do this thing, and she, who is dreadfully afraid of heights actually accompanied me onto the bridge, ashen-faced, along with our friend and anxious daughter.
The moment, I call it the Zen moment, is when you are buckled up and standing on the edge, with your hands behind your back holding the railings hard enough to crack bone, and you then have to will your hands to let go and put your arms straight out on either side of you, before leaping off the edge towards what seems certain death.
It is the moment that all other fears, doubts and perceived inadequacies are at once crystallised and condensed into a tiny, insignificant point. You see them all, even those that you hadn't even been able to acknowledge before, and you see that they are puny things in comparison to The Fear that is confronting you. In a strange, ironical way, you realise that if you don't face The Fear, all those lesser fears will regain their significance and perhaps have even more power and control over you in the future.
So I jumped...
Two months ago, I jumped again - this time off a 100m cliff in Zambia, near Vic Falls. I jumped to celebrate that first leap into the abyss, the one that I haven't completely landed from yet.
You see, my inner strength came coursing back in the skies above the Gouritz, I realised that I can overcome anything - especially self-imposed limitations. More importantly even than this, I regained the belief that I can achieve anything that I set my mind to as well. Within a year of that first leap, I started working full-time in publishing; doing work that I completely love together with a group of highly dedicated, professional people.
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