Assuming the ambient

You killed enemies both real and imagined.
Kurds were worthless as were your countrymen
to be used and abused at your whim,
now you are assuming the ambient.

What are your resolutions?

Well I believe there's someone watching over you
They're watching every single thing you say
And when you die they'll set you down and take you through
You'll realise one day that

The grass is always greener on the other side
The neighbours got a new car that you wanna drive
And when time is running out you wanna stay alive
We all live under the same sky
We all will live we all will die
There is no wrong
There is no right
The circle only has one side

We all try hard to live our lives in harmony
For fear of falling swiftly overboard
But life is both a major and a minor key
Just open up the chord

But the grass is always greener on the other side
The neighbours got a new car that you wanna drive
And when time is running out you wanna stay alive

We all live under the same sky
We all will live
We all will die
There is no wrong
There is no right
The circle only has one side
Well I believe there's someone watching over you
They're watching every single thing you say
And when you die they'll set you down and take you through
You'll realise one day that

The grass is always greener on the other side
The neighbours got a new car that you wanna drive
And when time is running out you wanna stay alive
We all live under the same sky
We all will live we all will die
There is no wrong
There is no right
The circle only has one side

We all try hard to live our lives in harmony
For fear of falling swiftly overboard
But life is both a major and a minor key
Just open up the chord

But the grass is always greener on the other side
The neighbours got a new car that you wanna drive
And when time is running out you wanna stay alive

We all live under the same sky
We all will live
We all will die
There is no wrong
There is no right
The circle only has one side

A beautiful song Side by Travis but with a single flaw, there is wrong and right and this coming year I my wish is to be able to see this and not keep silent when wrong prevails. Another song that has good resolutions is Animal Song by Savage Garden...

Superstars and cannonballs running through your head
Television freak show cops and robbers everywhere
Animals and children tell the truth, they never lie
Which one is more human
There's a thought, now you decide

So all this made me come up with my latest playlist for the Screaming Tangerines called Resolution & Revolution;

1. Travis - Side (4:01)
2. Avril Lavigne - Anything but the ordinary (4:11)
3. DJ Bobo - I believe (2:54)
4. Bosson - I believe (Up-Tempo Version) (3:15)
5. Stuck Mojo - For the Cause of Allah (4:43)
6. Surreal - You Take My Breath Away-DJ Tiesto Vocal Mix. (8:29)
7. Enrique Eglisias - Hero (4:24)
8. Placebo - The bitter end (3:10)
9. Mango Groove - Another country (4:20)
10. Hollies - He ain't heavy he's my brother (4:19)
11. Brian McFadden - Irish Son (4:22)
12. DJ Bobo - Keep On Dancing (3:35)
13. Pat Benatar - Warrior (3:51)
14. Stuck Mojo - I'm American (3:10)
15. Timo Maas - First Day (Radio Edit) (2:56)
16. Paul van Dyk - Wir sind wir (pvd club mix) (7:46)
17. DJ Bobo & Sandra - Secrets of Love (2006 Club Mix) (6:41)
18. Fleetwood Mac - Little lies (3:41)
19. Mike and the Mechanics - The Living Years (5:32)
20. Paul Hardcastle - Nineteen (3:33)
21. Bok Van Blerk - De La Rey (3:45)
22. Stuck Mojo - Open Season (7:25)
23. Savage Garden - The Animal Song (3:40)
24. Damae - Control (3:01)
25. Phd - I won't let you down (4:09)
26. Iio - At The End (3:39)
27. Johnny Clegg & Savuka - Scatterlings Of Africa (4:01)
28. I Saved the World Today - Eurythmics (4:52)
29. Kylie Minogue - I Believe In You (3:22)
30. Bok Van Blerk - Jy praat nog steeds my taal (3:45)
31. Johnny Cash - A thing called love (2:31)
32. ATB - I Will Not Forget (4:57)
33. Delerium - Silence - Sanctuary-Medly mix (8:02)
34. Metallica - Hero Of The Day (4:21)
35. Paffendorf - Welcome to Africa (5:51)
36. Cher - Believe (3:55)
37. Abel Kraamsaal - Stormwolke (2:59)
38. Toto - Africa (4:29)
39. HIM - Solitary man (3:37)
40. Madonna - Papa don't preach (4:30)
41. Mango Groove - We don't need a miracle (3:46)
42. Henry Ate - Life (4:28)
43. Ruslana - Dance With The Wolves (3:59)
44. Sarah Brightman - Here With Me (5:24)
45. Martin Solveig - Heart Of Africa (6:06)
46. Santana - America (4:35)

After listening to those songs here is my list for 2007, of which I hope to achieve at least 50% this year.
1. Listen to both sides of a story.
2. Not get stuck in a groove.
3. Believe in magic.
4. Stick to a project till the bitter end.
5. Be true to my roots in Family and Culture.
6. Be prepared to fight for freedom.
7. Remember to find Sanctuary and Silence each day.
8. Be a hero even if only to my cat!
9. Dance with wolves.
10. Be a good dad. My kids will one day decide which old age home they will place me in!

So there you have it...
"Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestations of strength and resolutions."
Kahlil Gibran (1883 - 1931)

Falling into the ring of fire

I Fell Into A Burning Ring Of Fire
I Went Down, Down, Down
And The Flames Went Higher

And It Burns, Burns, Burns
The Ring Of Fire
The Ring Of Fire

I hope it does Saddam! Enjoy eternity.

BBC pro muslim bias shines through

Once again tha BBC shows it's muslim loving streak;
"What the Ethiopian government doesn't understand is that it is making a continual enemy to Ethiopians at large"
Tsegaye Girma, Addis Ababa
When one views the comments the overwhelming majority are for the ousting of the muslim mafia but Auntie beeb has to quote one of the few negative views.

Rosie, Rosie stfu! Here is a FDA for her and WDA...

because of her temerity to utter this drivel;

O'Donnell, an outspoken co-host on ABC's The View, created by Walters, said Trump's news conference annoyed her "on a multitude of levels" and that the twice-divorced Trump had no right to be "the moral compass for 20-year-olds in America," amid roars of audience laughter.

Like she is a pillar of morality? More like a block of moronity, try this for her attempt at poetry;

i imagine it is interesting
as celeb feuds tend 2 b
so here r my thoughts

Note the infantile lack of capitals and sms-speak, this from a 44 year old woman that is no longer in her teens... classic Moonbat!

Update: #1 - Her Wiki is unbelievable... she is anti gun but hires bodyguards! Two faced ratbag pondscum!

Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one.

This quote by A. J. Liebling (1904 - 1963), was long before the Internet and Blogging. Today anyone with access to the Internet can put their thoughts, view's and rants on the WWW for all to see yet we still have Countries that cannot accept that the world is a village and try to stifle free speech. May they all fall like the Berlin wall!
With this freedom however comes a terrible responsibility and unfortunately we have people on the Internet that have no conscience or morals that abuse this wonderful gift with abuse, spam and other nefarious deeds. May they rot in hell!
Long live the ability for people to express their thoughts freely!

Island Missing, presumed lost by faux reporter.

"For the first time, an inhabited island has disappeared beneath rising seas. Environment Editor Geoffrey Lean reports."
When I read this I said to myself this smells like Lutkefisk and I was right, this island in the Ganges is part of a the world's largest river delta which by it's very nature is a changing land form, just one good flood and it can be changed overnight, this fact I did not even have to look up as it is elementary geology and common sense.
Which brings me to the point, the Island "disappeared" more then 10 years ago as far as I could find out! As the picture of the delta shows there are thousands of islands, some new some old, it is the nature of a delta as the inhabitants of New Orleans also found out during Katrina... water will always find the path of least resistance and wash away the weakest part of the land. I also believe that the disappearance of this island was due to the local people abusing the mangrove forest which helps stabilise the silt the land id made of.

Now once again a reporter has been exposed for fake reporting. This of course makes me question all reports henceforth from this source. Geoffry has done himself and the world a disservice by faking news.
The Town Crank also had the same idea as I did and posted this comment on his blog;
"It seemed to me that there could possibly be another explanation than "rising seas" to explain the disappearance of Lohachara Island."
He also searched the Internet like I did and exposed this report as a lie within seconds.
I am not saying that man had no influence in the ecology of the region but to blame it on Global Warming and supposed rise in sea level is sheer insanity.

Neat tools...

My new mini tripod for close up work is sooo cool of course I just had to try snapping a rodent up close! Now I can set up a picture, set the timer and voila, no shaky blurred close up's! Now I must get a beanbag to hold the lot down if I take extreme close up's, at present the camera tips over but so one learns.

"Anything looked at closely becomes wonderful." A. R. Ammons

Flaming Hell... More Tuesday Twits...

don't these people know the slightest spark can set this off? This is the second time this year as well and I think last year 1000 people were toasted. The pictures say it all... (warning graphic!)
"Witnesses said the rupture on the gasoline pipeline came shortly after midnight, with scavengers collecting the fuel in plastic jerry cans for hours before the puddles of collected petrol caught fire after dawn.
It wasn't clear what caused the rupture or ignition of the spilled fuel."
This deserves a Tuesday Twit Award.

Bringing knives to a gunfight...

"They are cowards," said Sheik Mohamoud Ibrahim Suley, an official with the Islamic movement, which controls most of southern Somalia. "They are afraid of the face-to-face war and resorted to airstrikes. I hope God will help us shoot down their planes."
No my muslim sheethead, they are brilliant military tactician's, why on earth use ground forces when you own the sky! I hope the bomb you and your fellow islamist bretheren to hell and back.
This happens when you piss off your neighbouring contry by threatning to convert some of their citizens to your death loving cult. Next time check out their inventory before making them mad. Welcome to 21'st century warfare Abu!

What is Christmas

To me it is a time of reflection and thanksgiving for a year that has wizzed past. Thankfull that everyone in my family is hale and hearty. Thankfull that this year was less traumatic than last year. Thankful that this special day, though it may be distorted by commercialism, greed and a thousand other things still is the day we celebrate the birth of The Saviour Jesus. May you all have a peacefull, wonderfull, joyfull Christmas.
"But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be ruler in Israel, whose going forth have been from of old from everlasting." (Micah 5:2).

The greatest gifts

Thanks Patrick for reminding me that we have 2 gifts to be gratefull for, One is that our Saviour was born today and second that brave people are willing to give all that we may be free. No greater gift has been given by God and man that they lay down their lives for the ones they love.

Our cousin Porkie

This is the Man's Dad's dog... don't let his name fool you... he is huge!

Present from Heaven

It started raining this morning and again this evening, 18mm at Dad's place and more at others. We really needed this, thanks for the present!
"Irrigation of the land with seawater desalinated by fusion power is ancient. It's called 'rain'." Michael McClary

The reason for the season

When I saw this I could not sum it up better... who needs Father Christmas and all the other stuff when the real reason lay in a manger...
I am sure that when God saw this cartoon He must have given a huge smile and maybe even a laugh.
Nice one dudes!
Over the Hedge is a wonderful cartoon strip and the movie was awesome, I really enjoyed Bruce Willis in the racoon role... I kept picturing Die Hard though!
By the way go and check the last 30 days worth of cartoons the ones with "Hammy's Christmas Wish" are brilliant!
"Nostalgia isn't what it used to be." Peter De Vries

Frodo4FingerZ we will miss you!

I was saddened to read about this today, a promising young engineer and artist has passed while doing something he dreamed of, I did not know him but after reading his blog The Grey Havens I knew him better.
My sincere condolences to his family.
This is the SANAE IV base where Dewald was stationed on in Antartica.

Pulling a Peter on Christmas

I was over on Jana's blog when I realised that much of the "Christian" world is doing exactly what Peter did by disowning Jesus after the Crucifixion by changing the wording of this time of joy when we celebrate the birth of Jesus. I am not going to debate the other issues regarding whether this is the true date etc.
The issue is that we are afraid to stand up for our belief in the Savior Jesus by calling it "Winter Holiday's" and other watered down names.
People this is Merry Jesus-Christmas! We may not back down on this because if we want to truly spread the Gospel we have to do it in a forceful way not by timidly backing down when someone says we are infringing on their "rights" not to be exposed to the Gospel. I mean we are talking about His Majesty, Wondrous Saviour and Ruler of the Universe.
There is no other God in any case!
So what are we afraid of?
He gave us the RIGHT to celebrate His coming to the world to save us all from sin so let us celebrate this day and proclaim His sovereignty in our lives and be an example to the world so others may see the Light and the Truth and hunger for this joy we have.

We fit... almost

That's me curled up in the flowerpot outside the door again...
Amber says she can fit into the box, she really can! By the way the Man says he has updated some linkythings on the blogrolly thing.

House of horrors...

well not quite but after finding the wierd stuff I reminded me of a house of horrors, this is going to be our new offices from next year. Hopefully we will be ensconced in bright airconditioned place that one can swing a camel, our present offices are darker than the rest of Africa and so small one can barely swing a mouse let alone a cat. Will post pics as things improve from the present mess. That "thing" nailed to the table is some waxworks abstract art thing... to me it was plain scary!

Oh, boss asked, "Why so many plugs"... errrr because we need 8 each boss! We do not just use a laptop like you, there is an encoder, the printer, the camera, the graphics controller etc. etc. We will still need some snapper strips!

Relocating is so much fun, almost like a holiday, NOT!

"[Abstract art is] a product of the untalented, sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered." Al Capp (1909 - 1979)

As we say here.. Jo jo, eish!

"Jojo Joseph of Edathua in the district was on Monday ordered to be beheaded for entering the holy place of Medina despite a bar on non-Muslims."
Now I wonder what the Swiss Guard would do if a muslim should happen to wander into the Vatican? Chop his head of with a battle axe? I don't think so!
It is time for this misogynistic religion to shape up or ship out and stop all the violent retribution for those that are not of similar persuasion.
Then and only then can we say they are a religion of peace...
One can hope can one not?

The "Jo jo, eish!" is referral to some of the quaint colloquialism's we have here in South Africa;
Jo jo = an expression of amazement.
"Jo, jo, that taxi almost sideswiped the bus!"
eish = an affirmation of any previous expression or used on it's own as well.
"Eish, we have many problems here"

Radicalism at it's best... PG18!

It is not often that one comes across a group playing your thoughts on a subject...


Oh... yeah... my first YouTube postin! Ahem, apologies for some of the language but this is the first time that I think it fits the song! Here are some of the lyrics, the rest are on their site as well as downloads for the song, please support em if you can. The leader Rich Ward also explains why they would rather you download, listen and then buy their music. I always knew performers sometimes got ripped off but this is just crimminal, maybe that is why their music is a tad aggro?

Open Season - Stuck Mojo
Music: Ward
Lyrics: Aborn, Nelson
String Arrangement: Eric Frampton

I speak peace when peace is spoken, But I speak war when your hate is provoking, The season is open 24-7-365, Man up yo time to ride, No need to hide behind slogans of deceit, Claiming that you're a religion of peace, We just don't believe you, We can clearly see through, The madness that you're feeding your people, Jihad the cry of your unholy war, Using the willing, the weak and poor, From birth drowning in propaganda, rhetoric and slander, All we can say is damn ya

My forefathers fought and died for this here
I'm stronger than your war of fear
Are we clear?
If you step in my hood
It's understood
It's open season

There should be Open Season on the music middlemen if you ask me.
Update I: Cross posted at Megalicious Mayhem... my resident madness.
Update II. Seems like YouTube is trying all sorts of shenannigans to hide this video without outright banning so I have put the url up in the title of the lyrics just in case.
"A change in the way that we, the music fans, get access to and discover new bands and music has been underway for a few years and now it seems like a revolution against the music business itself is finally on the horizon. This is a revolution that sees musicians, not the music industry, controlling the music we create and how our fans get access to it." Rich Ward

Our Tuesday twit is Mongane Wally Serote... But we will remember them, we don't need no steenkin wall!

Mongane Wally Serote is a twit, unfortunately his stance cannot be changed because his views are just as cast in stone as the wall he and his ilk are building between communities in this country. So Wally, thanks but no thanks, we will remember our fallen in other ways.
We will write books about their deeds, we will keep them in our memories and put their names on virtual walls for all the world to see.
I would rather see the names of our heroes, both living and dead on these memorials than with those of people that blew up innocent non combatants and necklaced so called collaborators in the townships. Terrorism is not heroism.

Some online memorials can be found here;
Saffer Wiki an online repository that is being built for all SA related military matters, from as early as we can gather, as well as the opponents side of things.
Honoris Crux recipients.
From a hero's daughter's perspective.

Some fish cannot fry

NOAA and the BBC had this amazing report on flatfish that seem to relish temperatures and acidity that would pickle and fry any normal fish.
We know so little about the world we live on and this is why my common sense tells me that we know even less about what drives our climate.
Yes, we are custodians and should not treat the world like a dump but to say that our actions are the only reason for Global Warming is to me a oversimplification and myopic view.
Here we have underwater volcanoes spewing liquid CO2 and other highly toxic chemicals into the oceans, do we know how many more there are? I seriously doubt that because we know more about the surface of the moon than the oceans on earth! But the most amazing part is that some forms of live seem to relish the extremes, I for one am sure that evolution has not stopped...

Close call

Saw this fir tree that almost took out somone's lapa while on my way to my therapist today. This must have happened on Monday when we had quite a violent thunderstorm but not much rain.
If I had any of these suckers in my garden they would be cut down post haste, Fir and Gum trees have this nasty habit of falling down when they reach my age...
By the way my therapist gave me a clean bill of health and a dent in my medical aid. Ce'st la vie I suppose.
"After twelve years of therapy my psychiatrist said something that brought tears to my eyes. He said, 'No hablo ingles.'" Ronnie Shakes

Lutefisk... no, just smelly Panga

Brian Lundemark at Rockwood Comic must have smelled my fishy disaster!


Saw these really nice Pangas at Plick&Pray on Thursday, all nicely flecked ready for the pan and at a good price... (note to self. NEVER EVER buy fish during a heatwave.)
Bought a bag of frizzen potato wegies to keep said fish cool on the way home but alas I decided to do the fish on Friday, there was still enough left over chicken for toasted chicken mayo sarmies!
(less hassles to knock together see...)
Big mistake... friday morning comes and I catch a wiff of Lutefisk, just a wiff mind you, could it be the tub of 2 month old vanilla yogurt that the kids begged me to buy but only ate 1/3?
Friday lunch... the wiff is becoming potent Lutefisk but it must be the chicken carcasse I left for the ferals... out it goes and joins the yogurt in the bin outside...
Back from work and I need a cold one when WHAM... Lutefisk attack... I take out the Pangas and pass out...
Ten munutes later the Lutefisk aka Panga is with the yogurt and chicken carcasse... Sigh! Always remember to fry when you buy when it comes to Pangas!
Thank goodness they came and cleared the trash today, by Sunday the whole neighbourhood was smelling of Lutefisk!
PS... I just read all about Pangas at Wiki... and these fish can be queer! No wonder they went off like that!
"Well, we tried the lutefisk trick and the raccoons went away, but now we've got a family of Norwegians living under our house!"
The Ole and Lena joke books.

A day to remember

Mijne Broeders en Mede-landgenoten,
hier staan wij tans op een ogenblik voor een
heilige God van Hemel en aarde om een
belofte aan Hem te beloven,
als Hij met Zijn bescherming met ons zal
wezen, en onze handen zal
geven dat wij hem overwinnen, dat wij die
dag en datum elk jaar
als en verjaardag en een dankdag zoals een
Sabbat in Zijn eer zullen doorbrengen;
en dat wij een tempel to Zijn eer stichten
zullen, waar het Hem zou behagen;
end dat wij het ook aan onzen kinderen
zullen zeggen, dat zij met ons erin moeten
delen, tot gedachtenis ook voor onze
opkomende geslachten.
Want de ere van Zijn Naam daardoor zal
verheelikt worden, dat de roem en eer van
overwinning
aan Hem zal worden
gegeven.
"With these words A group of about 470 Voortrekkers, led by Andries Pretorius, defended a laager (circle of ox wagons) against Zulu impis, ruled by King Dingane and led by Dambuza (Nzobo) and Ndlela kaSompisi, numbering between 10 and 20 thousand.
Partly due to the fact that the Voortrekkers used rifles and at least one light cannon against the Zulus' spears, as well as the good location and motivation of the Voortrekkers, only three Voortrekkers were wounded and none perished; that contrasted against the more than 3,000 Zulu warriors who died."
We celebrate the day of Reconcilliation today but at the same time we remember what God did that day as well. He has saved this country on many occasions and I just hope that people will always bear this in mind when times are tough.

I'm RICH... not! (PG13)

Don't you just love spam...
Got this in my inbox today and instead of dumping it in the spambox I decided to analyse the thing;

BRITISH LOTTERY
The Lottery Company
P.O Box 789
Harrogate HG1 2YR England
The above adress is real but that does not matter...

YOU HAVE WON £1,500,000 POUNDS STERLING
Yeah... Right, like I entered?

Our Dear Winner,

You have won the sum of £1,500,000 (one million five hundred thousand great British pounds sterling) from BRITISH LOTTERY on our 2006 new year charity bonanza.
Just like the 2005 one I got?

The winning ticket was selected from a Data Base of Internet Email Users,from which your Address came out as the winning coupon.

We hereby urge you to claim the winning amount quickly as this is a monthly lottery. Failure to claim your win will result into the reversion of the fund to our following month.

You are therefore requested to contact immediately out Claims Department below quoting winning number: WINNING NUMER-06010110.
Bogus...

Barrister. Luis Santiago
Luis Santiago is a fictional character in the television science fiction drama Babylon 5. Nice try sucker but you see I am a Babylon 5 fan!

Alpha Consultants Lawfirm & Schmidtz Associates
(Solicitors Advocates & Arbitrators)
Eh? Now they drag Space 1999 into the scam as well! The firm in question of course is a figment of their imagination.

Phone:+447024031089
Official Email: barr.santiago@yahoo.co.uk
Yeah, like a solicitor or lawyer would use Yahoo for their official comminication... very professional...

Provide the following information needed to process your winning claim.
Now we are getting to the real reason they contacted me!

(a) Your full Name
(b) Your full Address
(c) Your Telephone and fax numbers
(d) Your Age
(e) Your occupation
(f) Your country of origin
Ummm duh? What is written on my forehead? Stupid?

Congratulations once again.
Yeah... pisoff now, I am getting mad!

please quote your winning number.
Bwahhhaahhha...

Regards,
Mrs. Susan Moore
CO-ORDINATOR
the only Susan Moore I know is the Illustrator and somehow this does not seem to be her full time occupation...

Now excuse my french Susan aka Lius aka toto1k@bellsouth.net, piss off and try another trick next time, this was lamer than a donkey with three legs! I just wonder where they got my addy from? Seems like the planet still has the scum problem...
"For four-fifths of our history, our planet was populated by pond scum." J. W. Schopf

Star of the week goes to Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki

When I read articles like this my faith in humanity is renewed, so heceforth I will try to find a story worthy of Stellar fame each week.
"I have taken note of the decision reached and weighed its implications under the current economic conditions prevailing in the country, and do hereby turn down the offer," he explained. This man deserves a medal!
Now to convice the gravy train losers here in SA to follow suit... not likely though.

The thin Pork Line and Daar Ver in Darfur

JD is a mate of mine that still dons Cammo from time to time to do his bit, we have a Porcine problem of note in the Eastern Cape with an outbreak of Swine Fever, due to the fact that our Boys in Blue are conducting the war against crime they have asked the Army to stand in for them at the roadblocks that have been set up to enforce the Bacon Quarantine. Most roadblocks have a section of troopies, a Copper and a Vet/Dept. Agriculture representative to carry out searches of any vehicles that come from the affected province.
Hey... I am rambling... go read for yourself and see what the boys of John's Unit are up to.
On the subject of army and deployment... check out Capt. Werner's blog on his deployment in Darfur, a bit more exiting than checking for bacon smugglers. Not that stopping the bacon is less important...
Sorry John... we made real Swine of ourselves today ribbing you about the task at hand.

Hard Rock Carols by the Screaming Tangerines

Today's Rockwood made me laugh, this is the crazy time of the year when all sorts of artists bring out "Christmas" albums... some should just plain forget about the idea.
For one thing their style just does not suit the genre or in some cases the voice is a total mismatch and in other cases the image of Kid Rock singing Silent Night is just so wrong!
However I thought I may as well put up the playlist for my imaginary band the The Screaming Tangerines latest album Hard Rock Carols;
1. Dido - Christmas Day (2:14)
2. George Michael - Jesus to a child (6:50)
3. Deep Purple - Child In Time (4:06)
4. Andrea Bocelli & Celine Dion - The Prayer (4:30)
5. Cliff Richard - Snowfall on the sahara (4:25)
6. Yellowcard - Gifts and Curses (5:07)
7. Madelyne - Beautiful Child (Hiver and Hammer Mix) (4:07)
8. The Darkness - Christmas Time (Don't Let The Bells End) (3:26)
9. Nightwish - Bless the child (6:12)
10. Gregorian - Save a prayer (4:14)
11. Duran Duran - Save a prayer (5:28)
12. Belinda Carlisle - All God's children (3:49)
13. Evanescence - Snow White Queen (4:22)
14. Hooverphonic - Frosted flake wood (3:17)
15. DJ Sammy & Carisma - Golden Child (3:41)
16. Rolf Harris - Six white boomers (3:21)
17. Angun - Snow on the Sahara (4:17)
18. Linda Ronstadt - Winter light (3:17)
19. Wham - Last Christmas (3:19)
20. Gregorian Masters of Chant - The gift (4:50)
21. Vonda Shepard - Downey - White Christmas (2:40)
22. aromabar - winter pagent (3:56)
23. Ace of Base - I pray (3:18)
24. Texas - Prayer For You (4:46)
25. Queen - Thank God It's Christmas (4:19)
Wierd I know... but this is Whacky Wednesday! that is borrowed from the Steers Burger ad so let me end with a food related quote...
Dear Lord, I've been asked, nay commanded, to thank Thee for the Christmas turkey before us... a turkey which was no doubt a lively, intelligent bird... a social being... capable of actual affection... nuzzling its young with almost human- like compassion. Anyway, it's dead and we're gonna eat it. Please give our respects to its family..." Berke Breathed, Bloom County Babylon

Mango, Mango, the kids arrived safe!

Even with all the negative reports and my own disgust that Mango still has not got their kiosk up and running at Bloemfontein airport the kids arrived in Cape Town. Will get the full report when they get back on the 5th January... so far so good Mango!
Still do not know why we had to rush around getting faxes done an hour before they were supposed to check in though, I ascribe it to teething troubles and staff that are not yet up to par. You gets what you pay for I suppose.
I am still mad that I forgot my camera with all the rushing about! A pic of them leaving on a jetplane would have been nice... will try on the rebound... and report back.
"I wanna hang a map of the world in my house. Then I'm gonna put pins into all the locations that I've traveled to. But first, I'm gonna have to travel to the top two corners of the map so it won't fall down." - Mitch Hedberg (1968 - 2005)

Caught napping...

on the plants outside the door! But it is so cool there! This is me waking up after curling up in the flowerpot...

Fields of fossils

This past weekend I was in the Rouxville district on a farm doing some bonding and fishing... at the same time the owner showed me the fossils they had found in some rocks that had recently collapsed after rains, but what he did not tell me was that next to these rocks was a veritable field of fossils! I do not claim to be a paleontologist but even to my lay mans eye this is a remarkable site. So I have posted some of what I saw here for all to enjoy...

We are back...

had an awesome weekend, caught fish, watched the moon rise after midnight, saw fossils and generally relaxed... more to come.
While you wait... ponder the words of Keats;
"Tis the witching hour of night,Or bed is the moon and bright,And the stars they glisten, glisten,Seeming with bright eyes to listenFor what listen they?" John Keats (1795 - 1821)

Saturday morning mushrooms...

The dying embers as we headed of to catch a few zzzzzzzz's at around 2 am...

I found this mushroom after waking up at 6 am... rather stiff from sleeping on a very uneven campsite!

More of the mushroom rock, this will probably be washed out after the next big thunderstorm...

Another fossil fragment in the sandstone boulders strewn all along the koppie's edge.

And this was the last fish of the day and the biggest, please excuse the hat... it was the hat or a sunburned face!

A lekka day

The first Barber (catfish) caught by Piet, the owner of the farm...

Then Mac caught the first turtle, man do these critters HONK!

Then it got cold and everyone huddled around the braai fire...

While others warmed themselves under blankets others used the fire...

Much later the moon rose and the fishing carried on...

The bane of the traveler

The first of three stop 'n go's along the Reddersburg road... a section that should have taken 30 minutes took more than an hour! Then they were also fixing the potholes on the Reddersburg - Smithfield stretch but at least they did not hold up the flow too badly. Got to Rouxville about 45 minutes later than planned.
But we got to the dam in good time with enough day left to set things up for the big fishing expedition!
"You must dare to disassociate yourself from those who would delay your journey... Leave, depart, if not physically, then mentally. Go your own way, quietly, undramatically, and venture toward trueness at last." Vernon Howard

December 7, 2008. A date in infamy...

This is so important to read that I have taken the liberty to publish the article here as well, with Ray's permission of course!

Terrorism Raymond S. Kraft
October 24, 2006

December 7, 2008, began inauspiciously.

At 0753 at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, the attack that had triggered America's entry into World War II, sixty-seven years before, was ceremoniously commemorated, an honor guard, taps, a 21-gun salute, the bugle's notes and the rifles' crack drifting across the bay to the USS Arizona memorial, where Admiral Arthur Peterson, USN Ret., laid a wreath in memory of the sailors sleeping below, one of whom was his own grandfather.

On the West coast it was 1053, and in Washington D.C. it was one fifty-three in the afternoon, 1353 military time.

In 2006 America, tired of War in Iraq, had elected Democrats to modest majorities in both houses of Congress. Representative Nancy Pelosi became Speaker of the House, third in line for the presidency. In the spring of 2007, on a narrow, party-line vote, Congress, led by Senators John Kerry and Ted Kennedy and Barbara Boxer refused to authorize spending to continue the war in Iraq, and set September 30, 2007, as the deadline for complete withdrawal of American troops.

President Bush spoke to the country, to the American forces in Iraq, to those who had been there, and to the Iraqi people, to apologize for the short-sightedness and irresponsibility of the American congress and the tragedy he believed would follow after leaving task of nurturing a representative and stable government in Iraq half done, his voice choked, tears running down his stoic face, a betrayal of emotion for which he was resoundingly criticized and denounced in much of America's media.

The level of violence across Iraq immediately subsided, as the Americans began preparations to redeploy back to the States. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad praised the new Congress for its clear vision and sound judgment. America's Democrats rejoiced and congratulated themselves for bringing peace with honor and ending the illegal war based on lies that George Bush had begun only to enrich his friends in the military-industrial complex, and promised to retake the Presidency in 2008.


At 1000 on September 30, 2007, precisely on schedule, the last C-5A Galaxy carrying the last company of American combat troops in Iraq had roared down the Baghdad runway and lifted into the air. Only a few hundred American technical and military advisers and political liaisons remained in-country.

The Galaxy's wheels had scarcely retracted when Iraq erupted in the real civil war many had feared and foreseen, and which many others had predicted would not happen if only the American imperialists left Iraq. Sunni militias, Shia militias, and Al Qaeda militias ravaged and savaged the country, killing hundreds of thousands of Iraqis known or suspected to have collaborated with the Americans, killing Shias for being Shias, Sunnis for being Sunnis, Americans for being Americans, and anyone else who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

By noon, not one of the American advisers and liaisons left behind remained alive. Many had been beheaded as they screamed. Most of their bodies were dumped in the river and never seen again. In the next thirty days more than a million Iraqis died. The General Assembly of the United Nations voted to condemn the violence, and recessed for lunch and martinis. In America, there was no political will to redeploy back to Iraq. And after a few months of rabid bloodletting, the situation in Iraq calmed to a tense simmer of sporadic violence and political jockeying, punctuated by the occasional assassination, while several million refugees fled the country. Only Kurdistan, in the north, which had thrown up a line of its Peshmurga fighters to keep the southern violence away, remained stable and at relative peace.

In the spring of 2008 America began its quadrennial circus of a national election, and in November elected a Democrat, the Junior Senator from New York, Hillary Rodham Clinton, as it next president, to the surprise of few. Her running mate, to the surprise of many, was San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, whose intelligence, charisma, and reputation as an indefatigable campaigner for gay marriage and the homeless of San Francisco helped solidify Clinton's support among liberal Democrats who only grudgingly forgave her for not openly opposing the Iraq war sooner, and the Clinton-Newsom ticket went to the top with a narrow 50.2% lead over Republican John McCain's 49.8% of the popular vote, despite, or perhaps because of, Clinton's and Newsom's lack of foreign policy and military experience.

America, or a slim voting majority of it, felt it had had all the war it ever wanted to see, and Hillary had led her party to a glorious (if narrow) victory with the unambiguous slogan: "Clinton & Newsom: No More War." Crowds at every whistle stop had cheered and chanted, No more war! No more war! No more war! At victory parties George Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice were hung and sometimes burned in effigy, enthusiastic crowds chanted "No more war!" many times more, and local bands cranked up the theme from the first Clinton electoral victory, "Don't stop thinking about tomorrow...yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone...," and indeed, it was.

President Bush had been a very lame duck since the 2006 election, and with a Democratic Congress could do little but veto most of the bills it sent him. The Democrats couldn't override his vetoes, so for nearly two years almost nothing important had been accomplished by anyone on the Hill or in the White House. After the 2008 election it was transition time, flocks and herds of thoroughly demoralized Republican staff began leaving Washington in search of greener pastures, Congress adjourned for the Holidays, Democrats came house hunting, and Clinton and Newsom began the briefings they would get from a fully cooperative Bush administration on the state of the nation and the state of the world they would inherit and have to cope with for the next four years, or eight, and in those last weeks of November both Hillary and Gavin seemed to age rather quickly. The exhilaration of the campaign was over, and the weight of a tumultuous world began to settle on their shoulders.

Back in early October, 2006, North Korean President (for life) Kim Jong Il had announced the detonation of a nuclear bomb deep in a tunnel in the stony mountains of North Korea. The seismic signature had been small, and American intelligence at first doubted whether it had been a nuclear explosion at all. Traces of radioactive emissions were detected a few days later, and the intelligence estimate revised to conclude that it had been a failed test that produced perhaps only 10% or less of the expected yield, only 0.5 to 1.5 kilotons, not the 20 kilotons, at least, that Western intelligence had anticipated.

Kim Jong Il gloated. The deception had worked. The Americans were thinking in terms of long range intercontinental ballistic missiles with huge warheads that they could shoot out of the sky with their sophisticated billion-dollar anti-missile defense systems. He was thinking in terms of small warheads carried by small, medium range cruise missiles that could be launched from many places, and infiltrated close enough to slip in under the radar and hit America's coastal cities.

On the evening of December 6, 2008, a junior analyst in the National Security Agency was going over routine satellite photo production of ship movements in the Atlantic and Pacific within a thousand miles of the US coasts. Late in the shift he thought he saw something through a haze of fatigue and caffeine, and called a supervisor over to talk.

"Look," he said, photos up on several computer screens, more printed out and spread across his desk, "See? These boats, not big ships, fishing boats, yachts, they've been moving in along shipping lanes for several days, across from the South Pacific toward the West coast, up from the South Atlantic toward the east. Nothing very unusual, they're all small and slow, and scattered up and down the oceans, it seems, but if you look at the times and courses..." and he pulled out a chart he had plotted, "They're approaching so they will all arrive at about the same time, or all be about the same distance off the coast at about the same time...," he trailed off.

The supervisor looked a bit quizzical. "Coincidence? Probably. You need more sleep. Too much fun in the night, eh? Let me know if you see something we can do something with." And walked away.

At 0723 Hawaii time on the 67th Anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack three old fishing trawlers, about 100 miles apart, and each about 300 miles off the east coast, launched six small cruise missiles from launch tubes that could be dismantled and stored in the holds under ice, or fish, and set up in less than an hour. The missiles were launched at precisely one minute intervals. As soon as each boat had launched its pair, the skeleton crew began to abandon ship into a fast rubber inflatable. The captain was last off, and just before going overboard started the timer on the scuttling charges. Fifteen minutes later and ten miles away, each crew was going up the nets into a small freighter or tanker of Moroccan or Liberian registry, where each man was issued new identification as ship's crew. The rubber inflatables were shot and sunk, and just about then charges in the bilges of each of the three trawlers blew the hulls out, and they sank with no one on board and no distress signals in less than two minutes.

The missiles had been built in a joint operation by North Korea and Iran, and tested in Iran, so they would not have to overfly any other country. The small nuclear warheads had only been tested deep underground. The GPS guidance and detonating systems had worked perfectly, after a few corrections. They flew fifty feet above sea level, and 500 feet above ground level on the last leg of the trip, using computers and terrain data modified from open market technology and flight directors, autopilots, adapted from commercial aviation units. They would adjust speed to arrive on target at specific times and altitudes, and detonate upon reaching the programmed GPS coordinates. They were not as adaptable and intelligent as American cruise missiles, but they did not need to be. Not for this mission.

They were small, less than twenty feet long, and only 18 inches in diameter, powered by small, quiet, fuel-efficient, high-bypass turbofans, and painted in a mottled light blue and light gray ghost camouflage. Cruising at 600 knots, just below the speed of sound, they were nearly impossible to see or hear. They came in under the radar until they reached the coast. After that they were lost in the ground clutter. Nobody saw it coming.

At precisely 0753, Hawaii time, 1353 in the District of Columbia, sixty-seven years to the minute after the Pearl Harbor attack began, the first of six missiles to hit the Washington area exploded in a huge white burst of nuclear fire just 500 feet above the White House, which disappeared in a mist of powdered plaster and stone, concrete and steel. President Bush and President-Elect Clinton had been meeting with Condoleezza Rice and Mrs. Clinton's national security adviser, reviewing the latest National Security Estimate, when they instantaneously turned into a plasma of the atomic elements that had once been human beings. No trace remained.

Alarms immediately began going off all over Washington, and precisely one minute later the second missile exploded just as it struck the Capital dome, instantly turning thousands of tons of granite that had one moment before been the nation's center of government into thousands of tons of granite shrapnel that shredded several square miles of Washington like a leviathan Claymore mine. At precisely one minute intervals, four more 3 kiloton nuclear weapons exploded at an altitude of 500 feet AGL above the Pentagon, the CIA headquarters, the NSA headquarters, the FBI headquarters, all of which were fully staffed in the middle of the day. In five minutes, the government of the United States of America was decapitated, and a quarter million of the people who made the place run were dead, or dying, or had simply disappeared.

Also at 1353 Eastern time, a missile had blown off just above the New York Stock Exchange, in New York City, and thousands of years of collective financial knowledge and experience evaporated in the nuclear flame. In one minute intervals, others had hit the financial centers of Boston and Baltimore, and the Naval base at Norfolk, Virginia.

Simultaneously, within the same 10-minute window of hell, nuclear tipped cruise missiles devastated the largest intermodel shipping facility on the West coast at San Pedro harbor, exploded just above the Library Tower in central Los Angeles, and short circuited the computer technology ghetto of Silicon Valley in Santa Clara County, big time. One exploded ten feet away from the top of the Bank of America Building in San Francisco and set much of the east slope of the city ablaze. Another giant fireball flared among the phalanx of office towers along the Capitol Mall in Sacramento, instantly obliterating Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state government of California, the largest state economy in the US, the seventh largest economy in the world. Two ripped open the heart of Portland, Oregon, one shattered the financial district of Seattle, and the last one turned the Microsoft campus into a pillar of fire and smoke, wiping from the face of history, in a second, the IT giant that had revolutionized global communications.

It was 0803, Hawaii time. Ten minutes.

Three million Americans dead. And not a trace of the assault fleet remained on the surface of any ocean.

Vice-President Elect Gavin Newsom was in his bedroom at home in Pacific Heights, his window overlooking the Golden Gate and the Marin bluffs. He thought he heard an oddly loud crack of thunder and saw a flash reflected on the hills across the inlet, but it was a clear day and nothing else seemed out of place. He continued packing for the return trip to Washington, his second since the election, to continue his transition briefings and begin organizing his staff. His nomination as Hillary's running mate had come as a huge surprise, and he was elated.

Someone rapped on the door, loudly, twice, and without waiting for a reply the senior Secret Service officer on his detail opened it and stepped quickly in. "Come with me, now," he said. Gavin was startled. "I need to finish packing," he replied.

"No time, sir. Something has happened. Very big. I fear. No details yet. We have to get you out of here, NOW! RIGHT NOW! GO! GO! GO!" He grabbed Newsom's arm, swung him around, and pushed him out the door, where two other Secret Service agents flanked him down the stairs and out to a running black Suburban waiting in the garage. They pushed him into the back seat, jumped in, and the driver gunned the engine, out the drive, down the street, tires squealing. Nobody spoke until they were headed over the Bridge, northbound at seventy-five miles an hour, weaving through the traffic which wasn't yet the gridlock it would soon become.

"What the hell's going on?" he finally demanded.

"Okay. This is what I know," the officer said. "The US has apparently sustained multiple nuclear attacks in the last fifteen minutes, including Washington D.C. and San Francisco. Financial district. We're not sure how many, at least ten, maybe twenty. Lots of dead. Got the White House, the Capital, the Pentagon. Our job is to get you on an airplane at the nearest functioning airport, that'll be Novato, and get you to a safe place. Prestissimo."

"Where?" Newsom asked. Things were moving way too fast now.

"Don't know yet. We'll get orders."

The Air Force Learjet had been airborne for two minutes when a cell phone buzzed, and the Secret Service captain answered it and handed it off to the Vice President Elect. "It's Mr. Cheney, sir," he said.

"Gavin?" Dick Cheney asked. "Yes, sir," Newsom replied, subdued, for the events of the last hour had sobered up his elated mood considerably.

"Okay, Gavin. I don't know what you know, so I'll tell you what I can. There have been approximately 20 nuclear strikes on government and financial targets in the US, about an hour ago. No real damage estimate yet, except that it's awful. A hundred times 9/11, maybe a thousand times. I happened to be at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, and have moved into Cheyenne Mountain to set up a temporary HQ, until we get things sorted out. As you know Cheyenne was vacated by NORAD a few years ago, so we have plenty of space. You will be flown here, nonstop."

"I know you haven't a lot of national and international experience." Cheney had thought of saying that Newsom had none, but Newsom would be too painfully aware of that. He didn't need reminding. "The President is missing and presumed dead. So is Mrs. Clinton. So you may become the next president, in about six weeks. I don't know. he Constitution says the Vice President succeeds a president who is dead or disabled, but it doesn't say what happens if the President Elect dies before being inaugurated. I suppose the Court will have to answer that, if we can cobble one together by then. In the meantime, I will assume you will be inaugurated. You'll have a steep learning curve, a real steep curve. All presidents do, under the best of circumstances, and these are not the best of circumstances."

The next day a hard winter storm roared down the West coast from Alaska, pelting rescue workers in bombed out city centers with hard, cold rain, that did not let up for a week. People alive but injured or trapped in the wreckage died of hypothermia before they were found. Two days later, a cold front out of Canada brought heavy snow to the Northeast. Millions were already without electricity, and in a week of subzero weather hundreds of thousands more died. More than four million, altogether. More than one of every one hundred Americans.

Al Qaeda had picked December 7 because it was the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, and because, just before Christmas, the Infidel holiday, it would destroy the Christmas shopping season so important to so many retailers, driving another nail into the national economy of the Great Satan. And it would destroy the festive spirit of the season for millions of Americans, perhaps for all. The perfect psyop. Psychological warfare. And the weather forecasters had predicted severe winter storms on both coasts during the week immediately after disaster.

Al Qaeda leaders had calculated, correctly, that by turning up the violence in Iraq during the weeks before the 2006 election it could achieve an anti-war Democratic Congress that would vote to end America's wars in the Middle East, and then by turning down the violence in Iraq after the election of an anti-war Democratic Congress, it could lull America into a false sense of safety and security in anticipation of the "peace in our time" that America's new ruling party had promised would follow from what Al Qaeda perceived, correctly, as America's retreat before the unstoppable determination of the Islamic Resistance Movement, the Jihad. America did not call it that, of course. The Americans thought they were just ending a bad and illegal war ginned up by George W. Bush to depose Saddam Hussein who had proven not to have WMDs after all, the ones the Americans had never found, the ones buried in Syria. Al Qaeda saw more clearly. It was a capitulation, a de facto surrender of the Middle East to the coming Islamic Caliphate that would someday rule the world. The martyrs of Islam had beaten the Great Satan to its knees. In time they would cut off its head.

By Christmas, the American economy had imploded. Inflation soared, unemployment soared, businesses closed, cities that had suffered direct hits became ghost towns. Tax revenues evaporated, leaving state governments without funds to pay unemployment benefits or teachers' salaries. With the New York Stock Exchange gone, stock trading ended, and values plummeted. Retirement assets and pension funds disappeared in a wink. Nobody knew what to expect. Real estate crashed, and major banks filed for bankruptcy. With the collapse of the American economy, the largest on earth, the most productive country on earth, with just 5% of the global population producing one third of the global economic output, the rest of the global economy fell into chaos. Oil shipments stopped, food shipments stopped, and in that winter millions of people in third world countries starved to death.

The America era was over.

"In the spring of 1941, Nazi Germany was poised to dominate the earth. France, the low countries, Norway, Denmark, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Greece, and much of Poland had been overrun by the Germans. All of Europe, save neutral Sweden and Switzerland, was in the hands of Hitler's friends and allies: dictators or monarchs who ruled fascist Italy, Vichy France, Franco's Spain, Portugal, the Balkan countries, Finland, and above all the Soviet Union."

"A single German division under General Erwin Rommel, sent to rescue beleaguered Italians in Libya, drove Britain's Middle Eastern armies flying and threatened the Suez lifeline; while in Iraq a coup d'etat by the pro-German Rashid Ali cut the land road to India. In Asia, Germany's ally, Japan, was coiled to strike, ready to take Southeast Asia and invade India. No need to involve the United States; by seizing the Indies, Japan could break the American embargo and obtain all the oil needed for the Axis Powers to pursue their war aims.
"Hitler should have sent the bulk of his armies to serve under Rommel, who would have done what Alexander did and Bonaparte failed to do: He would have taken the Middle East and led his armies to India. There he would have linked up with the Japanese. Europe, Asia, and Africa, would have belonged to the coalition of dictators and militarists."

"The Nazi-Soviet-Japanese alliance commanded armed forces and resources that utterly dwarfed the military resources that the holdouts, Britain (with its empire), and the United States, could field. The English-speaking countries would have been isolated in a hostile world and would have had no realistic option but to make their peace with the enemy, retaining some autonomy for a time, perhaps, but doomed ultimately to succumb. Nazi Germany, as leader of the coalition, would have ruled the world."

"Only Hitler's astonishing blunder in betraying and invading his Soviet ally kept it from happening." - David Frompkin, Professor of International Relations and History, Boston University, writing in What If: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been (Putnam 1999) pp. 308, 309.

History is made, wars are won and lost, cultures and nations and civilizations come and go, rise and fall, as much by blunders as by victories.

The failure of many Americans, including many of the leading Democrats in Congress, and some Republicans, to fully appreciate the persistent, long-term threat posed to America's liberties and survival, and to the future of Liberal Democracies everywhere, by an Islamic Resistance Movement that envisions a world dominated and defined by an Islamic Caliphate of religious totalitarianism, and which will fight any war, make any sacrifice, suffer any hardship, and pay any price to achieve it, may prove to be the kind of blunder upon which the fate of America turns, and falls.

Raymond S. Kraft is an attorney and writer in northern California.