Captain Beefheart is no more

Captain Beeheart, also known as Don van Vliet (neither are his real name), has left us.
I first discovered his music in the late sixties when I realised that this was something out of the ordinary.
Beefheart was a talented painter that turned his mind to music. The genre may have been pop or rock, but Beefheart's musical efforts could have fallen within the avant garde of serious music or jazz just as easily.
Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band were frequently acclaimed by the critics, the intelligentsia and by other musicians. Critics from the more intellectual side of the river wrote lyrical streams about the way his music was constructed and the way they played together.
I only got to see Captain Beefheart once - at the 1972 Bickershaw festival.
Beefheart's most highly acclaimed album was Trout Mask Replica. This is the yardstick by which all subsequent avant garde music is measured. But Beefheart's debut album - Safe as Milk - contains some very special magic for me.
Beefheart left the music industry in 1982 to concentrate on his work as a visual artist. Commercial success in the music business proved to be elusive. Although many musicians claim to be influenced, the record buying public never really cottoned on. Most are really after something simpler and more accessible.
I still listen to bits and pieces of my Beefheart collection almost every day. The music hasn't gone stale and still sounds light years ahead of most of what hits the sound waves of the world.

Penguins at Boulders Beach in South Africa

And more penguins ...


These are African Penguins that live and breed at the Boulders Beach in Simons Town on the Indian Ocean in South Africa. The Penguin sanctuary is part of the Table Mountain National Park. This Penguin Colony began in 1982 with a mere two breeding couples. Today there are over 3,000 of these remarkable birds.

Images of Cape Town

48 Goud Street

This building, known only as 48 Goud Street lies in down-town Johannesburg. The walls are merely a shell - the roof and the interior are gone, Looking through the windows reveals only rubble. Perhaps a place where vagrants, the homeless manage to find some shelter. 

The fact that the exterior walls remain, suggests that this may be a protected building. A quick Internet search revealed nothing, so I would welcome any information that visitors may have on the building and its history. 

The building is different and unusual. Johannesburg has a poor record of protecting its heritage. There have been other earlier cases where is have been deemed necessary to protect only the façade. Perhaps this is one of those?

Still going strong without smoking!

Quitting smoking is easy. I've done it hundreds of times (with apologies to Mark Twain). This time it has been several months and we are still going strong. 

There are two keys that have helped make quitting a success this time. 

1. This time two of us quit together. For the first time, my wife decided to quit. 

2. The electric cigarette. We used two types - the Puffaway first, later the Twisp. Both are overpriced in South Africa. Both are good. The Twisp is better. The batteries and atomisers on either are not very robust. 

We have now reached the point where we can go without anything for many hours and probably indefinitely. I, for one, am too scared to go back to smoking. The cardiologist warned me that most of his patients were smokers. The other scary factor was seeing an x-ray of my lungs. 

I have seen too many people suffering and dying as a result of smoking. 

At long last we are no longer slaves to tobacco!

On the cloud computing - advantages, risks and issues

The advantages
On the cloud computing simply means computing on the Internet. For a small to medium sized enterprise, cloud computing presents a wonderful hassle free alternative. Cloud computing can also represent a great opportunity for personal computing.
The big advantage of cloud computing is that you don't need to maintain your own server or network. All that you really need is good fast broadband access to the Internet. The hosting service provider will do everything else.
It doesn't matter where you are. You simply need to log onto the Internet to access your data and your systems. You don't even need a laptop when you travel.
The hosting service takes over all your computing needs. It hosts your systems and stores your data. It takes care of backups and security.
This idyllic solution to your computing needs does of course depend on the quality of your service provider and that is where the risks and problems begin.
The risks
The first issue is security. Hackers have managed to hack their way through the most formidable firewalls. They have broken into the computer systems of major banks and even the Department of Defence.
A Web hosted service is just that much more at risk. What kind of security does your service provider offer? Is the data encrypted? Are all your staff using strong passwords?
The next question is reliability. Even Google has been known to have down-time. A Microsoft server failed while being upgraded and data was lost. How good are the backups? If the system crashes during the day, will you be able to recover the work saved since the last back-up?
Finally, you should ensure that the hosting service will be able to provide for growth. Is the service able to cope on your busy days? Many businesses experience peaks of demand for a few days every month. Your hosting service must be able to cope comfortably with these.
What should I do?
Cloud computing is a viable solution for many types of business. Storing data centrally - whether personal of for business - makes a lot of sense. It means that your data is always secure and available.
But before you embark on a service for your business, find out exactly what is offered and what is not. How secure is your data, and what happens when there is a system failure? If the hosting service is unable to provide satisfactory answers, then it is time to look elsewhere.

Competitive parenting

Competitive parenting is similar to keeping up with the Jones's. Perhaps it can even be seen as keeping ahead of them. The children of the family play a part in building the parents' self-esteem and social standing. Perhaps the parents themselves have not been as successful as they would have hoped. The children can help make up for that. 
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