Category: Life

The Anti-Rant

I think I’ve been ranting a bit too much recently so I’m going to write a completely positive blog entry.

Firstly, while I’m writing this I’m listening to my flippen awesome old friend’s band, civil twilight, off myspace. I can’t believe how far these guys have come from a garage in Hout Bay.

For many reasons that will be clear if you read my posts regularly, Rian, my girlfriend, decided to return her HP laptop for a full refund. Being the instant gratification junkie that she is, she decided she needed another laptop ASAP. She’s also been harbouring a rather latent mac fetish for a few years now. I had a bad experience with a powerbook a while back but admittedly it was in the midst of a bad life experience so maybe I was just confused.

We ended up getting a really good price and awesome service from Project3 near Cavendish. They knew their products and their price for the 2gHz core 2 duo, gig-o-ram flavour macbook was 1 mili-bar less than everyone else.

What is perhaps more surprising is how nice the little baby is. Her name is Joy because until her we just weren’t getting any joy.  She’s really bright, fast and light (13.3″)… and, yes, I’m liking OSX… so all my OSX fan friends (bje, tuna) can start to hope again.

Jumping madly to food I want to rattle off the names of a few restaurants that I like.

Greens (in Park Rd, off Kloof)

Greens is pretty much where all the pretty people who drink at Vida E around the corner go to eat, however, it is actually a really nice restaurant. Their portions are larger than you’d expect and the overall quality and environment is worth the few extra rand you’ll be spending.

Jimmy’s Killer Prawns (also on Kloof)

The company and amount of alcohol previously consumed at Relish probably had something to do with it, but the few times I’ve been there (yes, all after friday night drinks at Relish) have all been wonderful. Do yourself a favour and get some of the Jimmy’s Killer Prawns, they’re awesome. I think they may also still be doing their Tuesday night all you can eat sushi.

The Ocean Basket (heh, also Kloof but the one in the waterfront also seems good.)

While the Ocean Basket probably fights against the family restaurant stereotypes in the hopes of not becoming the “spur” for seafood, what they do offer is repeatability. Their prices are good, the food is good and the service, generally good. If you’re looking for seafood give them a visit. (The one in Canal Walk is not quite at the same level as the two I’ve mentioned here)

Krugmans (V&A Waterfront)

This one is a gem. Tucked behind the Kauia, below the cinemas, this suprisingly large restaurant is probably one of those places you avoided because they look like you’ll walk out sorry with an empty wallet. Luckily Krugmans seems to only look that way.  Sure, they’d gladly sell you a R1400 bottle of wine but they also have amazingly good value for money burgers for under R50 and all kinds of steaks under R90.  On the topic of wine. They don’t have House Wine, so be careful when the waiter rattles off a list of their 26 cab savs that you don’t pick the R38 per glass option,  a few times…

Ok, enough about food… I’m getting hungry.

Just one final prop to Momentum Short Term insurance. Having recently bought a car (I take delivery in a few hours) I now know the pain of purchasing a vehicle privately. However, getting it insured proved rather simple. I currently have my household and all risks stuff (laptops etc) insured through momentum. I realise that the fact that they had me on their “books” made this slightly easier. I dialed the number, waited less than 30 seconds, spoke to a knowledgeable consultant called Yolandi who gave me the quote in less than 2 minutes and gave me her *direct* number so that when I wanted to give the green light it would be simple. The next day I called the number, she answered and remembered my name, called my policy up, initiated the insurance, told me what me new total premiums would be and sent a confirmation fax to the vehicle finance people and an email to me. All in less than 3 minutes. I’ve subsequently got various quotes via *my* bank and none have come close.

This concludes my anti-rant.

ath

j.

More proof that you should *NEVER* buy anything from Computer Mania.

Now, most of you know that I’m a tolerant person… The kind of person who tries his best not to loose it when dealing with idiots and liars. But unfortunately I can honestly say that nobody, not even Telkom, has made me as mad now as the idiots who run Computer Mania.

Having eventually been told that we could come and collect a new laptop to replace the one that was obviously broken we drove out to Canal Walk to get our “new” laptop.

The box had been opened, and the laptop had been started up before. Knowing how brilliant Computer Mania isn’t, I should have known to check that *everything* was in the box… However, in reality I just wanted to get out of there before I punched someone.

We take the laptop and receive no apologies for anything.

Once home we unpack the box to discover the remote control is missing. Now, for the love of science, IF YOUR CUSTOMER IS ALREADY TELLING THE OTHER CUSTOMERS IN YOUR STORE NOT TO BUY YOUR STUFF, WHY WHY WHY NOT MAKE SURE THAT EVERYTHING *EVERYTHING* IS PERFECT WITH THE “NEW” REPLACEMENT.

To not do so just makes you look like an idiot… but really, there are plenty of idiots to go around at computer mania.

After multiple calls and multiple people saying they can’t do anything I decide I want something in return for all this shit.

I want some ram. Nothing big, just an extra gig to make Vista run properly. Dealer cost of that is probably not much more than the petrol I’ve wasted driving back and forth.

Eventually I get the actual regional manager on the phone. He claims that computer mania has done nothing wrong. He says that the random blue screening is so random that multiple people were able to reboot the computer multiple times and never get a blue screen… and yet, when I walk into the store I get a blue screen instantly.

I call him an idiot. Subsequently I think a better retort would have been that we should go gambling sometime. He seems to have amazing odds.

He refuses to give us more ram.

I tell him we want a refund. He says ok.

So all in all we’re going to be down a few bucks but hey it’s been worth it

ath

j.

———————————————————–

It’s funny how things work out… And how quickly news spreads. Even Sherri is following the saga.

Computer Mania is shit.

Sit back and grab a coffee, this is a fun story.

Ok, so my girlfriend finally decides to buy a new laptop… we search around for a good price on a decent laptop and eventually settle on an HP from Computer Mania. We go to the Canal Walk branch, buy the laptop and take it home… That’s when the shit starts.

First of all the laptop blue screens while we’re going through the initial installation process… I figure that it might just be a once off thing and we carry on… Then we notice that every now and again the screen blanks out for a few seconds and then comes back on. Driver issues? Maybe… Failing hardware?.. maybe.

Next we notice that the laptop doesn’t actually sit on all four of its feet. The front right hand foot is slightly off the table which causes the whole laptop to wobble while you type… not a lot, but just enough to be annoying.

We press forward hoping that the various issues will go away but they don’t… Installing printer drivers (Vista drivers from the Canon website) for a brand new printer fails and then crashes the laptop.

Eventually the laptop is blue screening on about 3 out of every 5 boots; offering the option of attempting a system restore as a way of trying to get back to a version of Vista that isn’t as broken as what we’re currently dealing with… but the system restore also crashes half way through.

Finally I get the laptop to attempt a scheduled chkdsk. This is an important part of the story. The scheduled disk check, a process that tries to run itself before Vista even starts up, crashes… This should really never happen unless you’re dealing with some serious hardware issues.

I decide that it’s time to take the laptop back to Computer Mania and have them look at it… I assume the obvious; that there is some serious hardware issue with the laptop and they’ll probably have to swap out a hard drive or maybe even the whole thing.

Taking the laptop back was relatively painless; We tell them all the things that are going wrong… I go into detail so as to help the technician with his job… They give us our blue slip and we go on our way… no hard feelings… If anyone is to blame at this point it is either HP or Microsoft. But then…

We wait a week. (Their invoices say they have a average turnaround time of 72 hours). Then a week later I get a call. They want to know what the password is. That’s odd I think. It’s taken a week and *now* they want to know what the password is? Have they even looked at it yet? Obviously not.

I give them the password and they say thanks and I go on about my day fully expecting it to be another couple of days before I get a call to say that they’ve swapped out the laptop due to faulty hardware… But no…

The next day I get a call to say that the laptop is ready… I’m amazed. Maybe it was just a really screwy installation of Vista that was causing all the problems and now that they’ve reinstalled everything is working fine. Except they hadn’t reinstalled. Apparently a “system restore” did the job. Odd, I tried that… but ok. OH, and they removed some malware. REALLY? REALLY NOW? You removed some malware from the laptop? As a systems engineer who’s had to deal with real security issues for a very long time I struggle to believe that the laptop had malware on it. I know Vista aint exactly BSD, but it’s not *that* bad. The only time we ever ran Internet Explorer to download Firefox. I called Bullshit on the malware claim and told the technician to find out what Malware was on the laptop and call me back

‘Tracing Cookies‘ (sic)… You have got to be f-ing kidding me. First of all buddy, the term is “tracking cookies” and secondly, that’s not malware. It’s just cookies… regular old fashioned… cookies. Calling cookies malware is like calling a pillow a weapon. But this just so happens to be the way that shit computer companies try to scare their customers into believing they’ve added some “value” or “fixed” their computer.

Ok, so I’m pissed about the malware thing, but I’ll deal. The laptop just better be fixed. I ask the technician to please reboot the computer a few times during the day and make sure that the random blue screens are fixed so that I don’t drive all the way out to canal walk for no reason. He says he will. You can see where this is going can’t you?

So tonight we drive to canal walk, eagerly awaiting the return of the now-in-perfect-working-order laptop. I greet the guy Jean (sp) that we checked the laptop in with and he goes and fetches it from the back. I tell him I’d like to boot it up a few times just to make sure… no problem he says.

10 seconds into the first boot and it blue screens.

Now see, I know computers are frustrating… I know they can be unpredictable and difficult to diagnose etc. But really, was everyone involved in the ‘repair’ of this laptop either ignorant or just plain lying? I showed the blue screen to Jean. He acted suprised but I don’t really think he was. He repeatedly tried to deflect the fault on to someone else… his managers, the technicians, “head office”. I kept on telling him. YOU ARE COMPUTER MANIA, you can not disassociate yourself from computer mania.

I told him I want a replacement laptop. We’ll just start from scratch… he can’t do it. I asked to speak to the manager… OH, he *is* the manager. This is almost humourous. Eventually after moaning enough he calls his “regional manager” at home. I appreciate this. I suspect it may be possible for the regional manager (I mean that sounds like it’s an important person right?) to authorize Jean to just hand over a new laptop to make a bad situation go away.

Nope. Regional Manager says that the best they can do is repair it in the morning and have it ready by tomorrow afternoon. Well guess what. That’s not good enough. We dont want that laptop back. We want a new one. One that sits flat on a desk, one who’s screen doesn’t blank out randomly and most of all, one that WORKS!

But hey, what can I do?… I ask to get the phone numbers of all the various manager people and the name of the oke who obviously lied to me when he said he would reboot the laptop a few times just to make sure. I make some mention of bad after sales service and Jean retorts with something along the lines of “no we don’t”… I’m amazed. He still feels that ‘he’ and ‘the store’ are not ‘Computer Mania’ and so therefore he can say that ‘they’ have great customer service. I start trying to explain this to him and then I think (and verbalise to Jean) “What’s to stop me going over there and telling that customer who’s looking to buy a laptop that Computer Mania has bad after sales service?”… ‘Nothing’ Jean replies obviously not realising how much of a dick I can actually be.

So I do. The customer says thanks while the shellshocked salesmen trying to sell him a laptop grins sheepishly in the background. Ahh, that did feel good, thanks for the go-ahead Jean.

So, what I want is a new laptop. I dont wan’t that one back, it obviously has issues… but then again, so does computer mania… so what can you do?

ath. I’ll keep you posted.

Body hack…

Apparently I’ve pinched a nerve in my back. This results in random searing back pain accompanied shortly thereafter by nausea and headaches. It’s not comfortable but one thing that Rian read about today did help amazingly. Take a block of ice, put it in your mouth and push it up against the back of the top of your mouth… Apparently this cools your hypothalamus which, for some types of headaches, stops a feedback cycle and can occasionally fix a headache in its tracks. It worked for me!

j.

My sworn statement

Statement from Jonathan Endersby of Accident on the night of 29 March 2007

My girlfriend (Rian xxxx, Witness 2) and I had just finished walking around Rondebosh common and had just climbed into our car when we heard a car screeching to the right of us. The car, driven by AJ xxxxxx had lost control and skidded across the road, through the parking lot and collided head on with the back right side of the parked Jeep which was not occupied at the time.

I saw the vehicle the whole time that it was skidding and had clear line of sight of the collision. My car was parked less than 8 meters away from the scene of the accident.

I climbed out of my car and ran over to see if the driver was ok. The driver climbed out of his vehicle and we asked him what happened. His exact reply was “I didn’t see the corner”.

An elderly coloured couple who had been parked to the right of the Jeep in the parking lot also came over to see what had happened and they told me that the driver had thrown a bottle out of the car before he climbed out. (I later pointed out to the police that there was a plastic coca-cola bottle which smelt like brandy next to the car)

The television in his car was on upon impact.

I took a picture of the car’s license plate because I was worried that the driver who seemed to be panicking would try and drive away.

— D([“mb”,”the vehicle so as to not panic him any further.u003cbr />u003cbr />I walked back to the car and heard him on the phone with his friendu003cbr />asking his friend to come and fetch him… Again, his exact words tou003cbr />his friend were “…I need to get out of here…”u003cbr />u003cbr />I walked up and told him to show me his license at which point he gaveu003cbr />it to me and I took a photograph of it with my phone. I confirmed thatu003cbr />the driver of the car was indeed AJ Muller as per his driver\’su003cbr />license. The driver then took his drivers license back and I told himu003cbr />to wait for the police. He did not listen to me and started walkingu003cbr />away from the car. I told him again to stay and wait for the policeu003cbr />but he continued to run away. At no point did I or anyone elseu003cbr />threaten the driver.u003cbr />u003cbr />About 5 minutes later a tow truck driver arrived who again phoned theu003cbr />Rondebosh police department.u003cbr />u003cbr />Within a few minutes the owner of the vehicle, Simon, arrived with hisu003cbr />girlfriend/wife?. They had been jogging around the common. We toldu003cbr />them what had happened and that the driver had run away. Simon ranu003cbr />down the road to see if he could see the driver but didn\’t find himu003cbr />and came back.u003cbr />u003cbr />A few minutes later the police arrived.u003cbr />u003cbr />I have never met the driver (AJ Muller) or the owner of the Jeep (Simon).u003cbr />u003cbr />I can be contacted on 0824143129.u003cbr />u003cbr />I agree that all of the above information is true and I am prepared tou003cbr />testify to that fact in court.u003cbr />u003cbr />Regardsu003cbr />u003c/div>”,1] ); //–>The driver seemed like he wanted to run away so I then told him that I wanted to see his driver’s license. He asked me if I had a cigarette and again I told him that I wanted to see his driver’s license. He started to look through his car for his license and I phoned 10111 to get the phone number of the Rondebosh police station whom I then called and reported the accident telling them that I thought that the driver was drunk and was going to try and run away. The driver did not hear my conversation with the police because I had walked away from the vehicle so as to not panic him any further.
I walked back to the car and heard him on the phone with his friend asking his friend to come and fetch him… Again, his exact words to is friend were “…I need to get out of here…”

I walked up and told him to show me his license at which point he gave it to me and I took a photograph of it with my phone. I confirmed that the driver of the car was indeed AJ xxxxxx as per his driver’s license. The driver then took his drivers license back and I told him to wait for the police. He did not listen to me and started walking away from the car. I told him again to stay and wait for the police but he continued to run away. At no point did I or anyone else threaten the driver.

About 5 minutes later a tow truck driver arrived who again phoned the Rondebosh police department.

Within a few minutes the owner of the vehicle, Simon, arrived with his girlfriend/wife?. They had been jogging around the common. We told them what had happened and that the driver had run away. Simon ran
down the road to see if he could see the driver but didn’t find him and came back.

A few minutes later the police arrived.

I have never met the driver (AJ xxxxxx) or the owner of the Jeep (Simon).

I can be contacted on 082xxxxxxx.

I agree that all of the above information is true and I am prepared to testify to that fact in court.

======================================================================

The best part of this story is that the kid in the car is now claiming that 2 white males beat him up (which would explain his injuries???) and laying charges to that extent. He’s 21 and was a real class act… low profile wheels, tv, racing seats, nightstick in his car etc. (oh, and drum brakes on the back…idiot)

The police are charging him with reckless driving and leaving the scene of an accident because they can’t prove the drunk driving. If he starts purjoring himself as well he might be in a worse situation than if he’d just taken the drunk driving rap. His parents arrived at the scene about an hour later and apparently he’d been crying on the phone with them.

Oh, and the skid marks were over 50 meters long. If you go to the parking lot soon you’ll still be able to see the spray painted markings where the cars were and then look for the dot on the road which is where the skid marks started.

His car is a write off, the jeep looks fine.

Human Wrongs Day

sharpevillemassacre.jpgBecause it seems that far too few people know this, Human Rights Day (21 March) is a commemoration of the Sharpeville Massacre where 69 innocent people were killed and over 300 more were injured during a mostly peaceful protest against the Pass Laws.

The Sharpeville Massacre marks a watershed moment in South African history. The event was one of the first times that the international community stood up and took notice of the truly brutal and oppressive regime in power. The event made it to the international press and four days later the government banned all black political organisations. Many leaders were arrested and many others were forced into exile… and this, unfortunately, happened in 1960.

To put that in perspective; South Africa only got its freedom in 1994… If we assume that the recent events that took place in Zimbabwe were Zimbabwe’s Sharpeville (which I doubt), Zimbabwe would be due for freedom in 2041.

I sincerely hope that progress can move a little quicker with pressure from countries like South Africa… 13 years is a very short time to forget what oppression feels like and the passion with which it was fought, Mr Mbeki.

ath,

j.

New ideas for the restaurant reviews site…

cappucinoLike I was saying to Joe earlier, every time I speak to people about this restaurant website they seem to want to get involved or they have some excellent idea to add to the concept.

So the basic premise is a web 2.0 (and by web 2.0 I mean user generated content etc) restaurant reviews website where the reviewers are broken up into various bands according to their karma and the number of reviews they’ve written. New reviewers have their first 5 reviews moderated. Once they’ve got past their “New Reviewer” status they become “Reviewers” who can invite additional people to join the site but they only get 1 invite per review they write.

All the reviews are rated in digg’esqe manner and reviewers gain or lose karma (trust) accordingly.

Reviewers who achieve certain levels of Karma and write a minimum number of reviews become “Food Gurus” who have additional functionally available to them.

Food Gurus are the people who

  • Moderate the “New Reviewers” reviews for quality etc
  • Are also responsible for updating the non-review based restaurant data (addresses etc)
  • Respond to reviews that have been tagged as “inappropriate” or “suspicious” and potentially banning dodgy reviewers etc.

The idea is that the trust based invite system will hopefully keep the site as honest as possible. Continue reading “New ideas for the restaurant reviews site…” →

Becoming an Amphibian

“Every generation needs a new revolution.”
Thomas Jefferson

I make no pretence that anyone besides a few close friends read my blog, but those that do deserve to know.

I resigned. A while back actually. I’m not going to mention names because that would be tacky but I was not happy and for some pretty big reasons.

Vision was the single biggest reason. No vision… or, to be fair, vision without the ability to achieve it. (Actually, vision and the delusion of being able to achieve it.)

So I’m moving to Frogfoot to become a revolutionary.

One day I’ll write a full post on what to look out for in an interview but for now I’ll just bite my tongue.

ath

The good, the bad and the overpriced.

I’ve been toying with the idea of creating a web 2.0 restaurant review site with a few twists and the obligatory overuse of gradients, big buttons, whitespace and ajax 😉

Twist 1: The actual review has to be less than 160 characters. This is not so that it can be SMSed but a way to keep people to the point.

Twist 2: When you write a negative review for a restaurant you’ll be asked to provide a “rather go to” restaurant.

Twist 3: I’m thinking of keeping it super simple with just a single star rating accompanying your 160 character review.

Twist 4: Reviewers are brought on board by invitation only… Every user’s first 5 reviews are moderated and you can only invite other people to be reviewers once you’ve reviewed 5 restaurants.

(For those of you who actually read my last rant about systems and rules; The rules I am talking about here are rules that define the specialist functionality… There are plenty of review sites that let anyone paste pages of drivel and never get to the point.)

As any good systems person would, I always test my ideas:

Restaurant: Krugmans, V&A Waterfront

Review: What a lovely surprise of a restaurant! It looks like it’ll cost an arm and a leg but the service is top notch and the food is great. I had their huge camembert & sweet chilli burger at R47. Awesome! (160)

Average Main Cost: R50

Star Rating: 5 out of 5

Restaurant: Cape To Cuba, Kalk Bay Review: Great décor but sadly the quality of food seems to have slipped. We were two large groups and only about 30% of us were “happy”. My meal, the fillet strips in chilli and chocolate, was not worth R99. (160)

Average mains cost: R70

Star Rating: 2.5 out of 5

Rather go to: Polana

Review: Chapmans, near Chapmans Peak, Hout Bay

Review: We only had two deserts and two cappuccinos. The brownies were bad, the tiramisu was bad and the cappuccinos tasted like watered down wimpy coffee and presented similarly. The bill was R90.

Average mains cost: No idea, didn’t look.

Star Rating: 0.5 out of 5

Rather go to: No idea, Where is good in hout bay?

What do you think of the idea? While typing this I thought that one benefit of the 160 character thing would be that you could get the review sms’ed to you… but really, sms is a retarded format that hopefully wont be around in a few more years?

Anyway, let the debate make it stronger or kill it early so I don’t waste my time.

ath,

j

Never let your processes get in the way of what the customer wants

press button hardSo the gf and I decided to grab some food before we hit the ice bar. We sat down at the Little Mermaid, a restaurant in the V&A waterfront, and perused the menu hoping to find something that looked appetising at a reasonable price. We both eventually settled on getting their lunch steak… a decent looking meal for fifty something rand. The only problem was that it was past 6 and their “lunch” cut-off time. Never fear I thought, I’ll just ask nicely. Surely they would be ok with that?

Nope. Even though we said we would leave if they refused to sell us the meal, they still declined. It’s a well known fact that restaurants with two menus usually do so in order to get more money out of their dinner time guests. Before we left I decided to go and speak to the manager to get their side of the story. Their story was this: They had a system in the kitchen and that system dictated that at 6pm they packed away the lunch time steaks and unpacked the R40 more expensive steaks for dinner.

I stood there dumbfounded, 100% in something akin to a moral dilemma… As a systems person I can understand their argument, whether you believe them or not, that systems make sure that the world works and in the absence of systems you end up with chaos. But, on the other hand, I wanted my fscking lunch steak and I wasn’t prepared to pay extra just because I got their a few minutes late.

I walked away temporarily pacified, but the more I thought about it the more I realised how wrong they were. Their system was limiting their ability to serve the customer properly. I wouldn’t have been told it was “impossible” at the Cape Grace, the 5 star hotel nearby, a point I made but was lost on the two managers.

Really what this highlighted was how the systems we interact with (or design) can be fundamentally flawed by our own need to “stick to the rules”. I’m obviously not calling for all out anarchy, but I do believe you need to ask yourself one fundamental question when implementing a rule in the systems you design:

Is this rule limiting the freedom of the user and their interaction with the system to an extent greater than that which is required to keep the system running?

In other words: Could the restaurant have sold me a fscking steak without going bankrupt? The obvious answer here is yes, and it becomes more obviously “yes” when you consider that any user (customer) who feels like the system did something special for them is going to feel a certain affinity for that system (restaurant) and probably return multiple times.

The more you become aware of this the more you start to see it in real life. I had my wallet stolen and upon getting my new cards, signed up for internet banking only to discover that by default my monthly transfer limit was set to R0; something that requires you to go into the bank with your ID to change… This wouldn’t have been such a major issue if I hadn’t JUST LEFT THE BANK where the teller told me that all I needed to sign up to internet banking was my card number and PIN. In addition to that, my beneficiaries were all deleted… Why did my internet banking profile had to even get removed? Couldn’t they just have unlinked it from one card number and added it to the new one? Did they even think of the customer when designing these systems?

Then vodacom… I want an Nokia E61. I’m due for an upgrade in 7 months, BUT I’m willing to PAY THEM MONEY in order to get the upgrade now. Apparently this is impossible?

Can you think of other systems where a rule has been put in place that makes no sense and impacts the user negatively? Perhaps more important, can you think of systems where the designers have had the foresight to make the system flexible enough to accomodate the more unusual requests?