Dizzy Dee

Please note that this is not meant to condescend to any specific group of South Africans, its merely a humorous look at one of the accents in South Africa…

Beck - not the front

Beds - doves, vultures, etc.

Ben - to set alight

Cut - a small vehicle drawn by a donkey

Errors - districts, e.g. “Ebbon errors” (urban areas)

Feather - implies distance - Cape Town is feather than Johannesburg

Guddin - around your house, where you grow plunts

Get - a hinged opening in a fence

Hair - as opposed to him

Hiss - masculine form of hairs

Itch - as in “itch and aviary pairsin”

Kennel - Army officer

Len - to acquire knowledge

Pee-Pull - Die Mense / people

Phlegm - the hot part at the end of a candle

Piss - symbolised by white doves

Suffa-Ring - as in “the pee-pull are suffa-ring”

Parrot Teksi - not a mamba of the teksi assoseshen

Toks - Negotiations

Weaner - the weaner takes all

Wekkas - they do the wek

Weld - The Earth

You know I am always going on about backups. I cannot stress this enough. It is important to make backups. Even if its of things you think you will never use again.
I got myself a 250GB external hard drive a while ago, which works like a charm (If I remember to backup obviously).

But for those of you who do not have something like this, its now easier than ever. For $9.95 per month for 5GB you use IBackup’s Online Storage.
You can sign up for the free trial on their website just to make sure that it is what you want. Pretty cool, huh?

This is a warning to the people who don’t live in South Africa, but plan to travel here at some point or another. Please note, if you’re from a country where you can rely on public transport, this post is especially for you. You need to note that public transport is not safe - and shouldn’t be attempted unless you’re really brave. Rather consider renting a car from Avis, or any of those agents…

Whilst being in England I realized for the first time that there are people who don’t have a driver’s license. Adults who have never driven a car!! How strange? This is not a weird thing apparently - people don’t need to drive there - they just hop on a bus or a train, or phone a taxi.

In South Africa its a bit different. Yes there are buses . And yes, there are taxi’s. But you need to note that when you use either of these it might be the last thing you ever do.

These are not taxi’s like you know them in the UK or the US. They’re minibus taxi’s, which (as far as I know) are allowed to have only 16 passengers (but are often overloaded). The taxi drivers have long since been notorious in South Africa. Not all of them, but a lot drive like the devil himself. I have been fortunate enough not to have had to use a minibus taxi, but I have friends who don’t have any other means of transport BUT taxi’s. These friends, and millions of other people are dependent on these maniac drivers. Its their only means of getting to work, the shops, and wherever else they have to travel.

Quoting Thomas Thale: “MINIBUS taxis are by far the cheapest and most popular form of public transport in South Africa, used mainly by the urban and rural poor. But if you are a visitor to Johannesburg, using a taxi can prove bewildering and even frightening.”

Buses are all the same. In the past month I have seen two bus accidents on my route to work, and three taxi accidents in Pretoria. Just to give you an idea, I live about 7km from work. All these accidents were due to speeding & reckless driving (I.e. running a red traffic light). Obviously depending on which bus driver you land up with, but most of the ones I come across drive like they stole the bus.
Firstly they endanger the passengers - people who have no other means of transport - if they don’t take the bus / taxi they don’t get to work. Secondly normal road users are subject to share the road with these people. It really angers me.

Car accidents in South Africa are as common as snow in Russia. We listen to the list of junctions and roads to avoid every morning and ever afternoon on our way to work and home. Everyone knows someone who’s been in an accident - if they weren’t in one themself. Its strange how we just put up with it really?? Its strange how people get arrested for not paying parking tickets, but bus drivers and taxi driver get to endanger thousands of people’s lives each day - without any panelization. I have never seen the Metro police give a ticket to a taxi or a bus driver. Maybe I’m just never in the right place, but its unheard of. These people have schedule, and whatever we do, we dare not interfere with the schedule. It might just cause that they get one bus load less of passengers.

So instead the public sit in their cars, irritated, but too scared to do anything. The Metro police don’t intervene because … I don’t know why?…

For millions of sleep-deprived mothers around the world, this woman’s findings could be a miracle! Priscilla Dunstan, a mom from Australia with a special gift, says she’s unlocked the secret language of babies.

When Priscilla was a toddler, her parents discovered she had a photographic memory for sound. At age 4, she could hear a Mozart concert on the piano and play it back note for note.

Priscilla says her gift has helped her hear a special “second language” beyond English, allowing her to detect moods and even diagnose illnesses! “Other people might hear a note but I sort of get the whole symphony,” Priscilla says. “So when someone’s speaking, I get all this information that other people might not pick up.”

That mysterious second language took on an astounding new meaning when Priscilla became a mother to her baby, Tom. “Because of my gift for sound, I was able to pick out certain patterns in his cries and then remember what those patterns were later on when he cried again,” Priscilla says. “I realized that other babies were saying the same words.”

Here is the short version:

• Neh=”I’m hungry”
• Owh=”I’m sleepy”
• Heh=”I’m experiencing discomfort”
• Eair=”I have lower gas”
• Eh=”I need to burp”

Those “words” are actually sound reflexes, Priscilla says. “Babies all around the world have the same reflexes, and they therefore make the same sounds,” she says. If parents don’t respond to those reflexes, Priscilla says the baby will eventually stop using them.

Priscilla recommends that parents listen for those words in a baby’s pre-cry before they start crying hysterically. She says there is no one sound that’s harder to hear than others because it varies by individual. She also says some babies use some words more than others.

The Dunstan Baby Language DVD is currently available. Visit www.dunstanbaby.com to order your copy.

And NO, I do not have children, I just find this extremely interesting. I was an au pair for a while, but for babies who were talking / starting to talk. It’d be interesting to try this out though, so those of you with babies, let me know if it works please?

Sources: Oprah

Everyone is disappointed at some point or another. And its even worse if you love the person and they you. Why are we disappointed? Obviously because we expect something more or different, and then don’t receive the wanted attention, or expected behavior. This might be due to a lack of communication or even just because the other person was selfish or inconsiderate.

Whatever the reason, it is more important to learn to deal with it. Not as a couple. But you, and I as individuals. Even if the other party doesn’t apologize or show regret. To remain emotionally healthy yourself, you need to forgive the person, and move on, right? Right… Its not always so easy.

It is very important to realize that we cannot hold other people responsible for what we feel. What you feel is up to you. If you were disappointed, you should review your expectations of the other person? Is it fair? Sometimes the other person was really at fault, but very often it was just a difference of mindset.

Your girlfriend might like it if you text her to say goodnight every single night, but to you it seems senseless to send the same message each night? She will take offense if you tell her that you feel you’re waisting your money - its the thought that counts, remember? The point is we all have different outlooks on life, and to merge that and remain happy is tricky.

It is important to be realistic about your expectations. Your boyfriend will not give up his sport for you every single weekend. Abandon childish demands and foolish expectations. Most guys love their sport, and for them to give it up, is like to ask of you to give up your make-up. It ain’t gonna happen. Be fair about what you expect!

Admit to yourself that you had expectations that were not met, and then move on. Forgive the person. Talk about your expectations to the ‘disappointer’, and tell them how you feel. Most of the time the disappointment might be over something that isn’t such a major issue in any case. Try to think to yourself if you would still be angry with that person if they were lying on their death bed. Would you be willing to forgive them then? Would you be willing to see it over? If you would, then it wasn’t such a big deal really!!

Relationships so often turn into what I WANT. What I NEED. And what is important to ME. Make sure that you keep yourself focussed on the other person. Remember things that are important to THEM. If you are still unhappy in the end, you should consider the worth of the relationship altogether.

I started writing this about a year ago, and it has been in my drafts ever since. This morning I decided to finish it. People are still late regularly. Is it just in my life that people do this, or can you relate to my frustration?

Something which to me is incredibly important doesn’t seem to bother many other people. If you have an appointment you should be there on time right? RIGHT! I know I spend my time really weird - having coffee and watching morning news for the first hour after waking up, and then I have to squash everything else into the remaining 15 minutes. Make-up, hair, clothes — never mind packing lunch
BUT, I am ON time 99.9% of the time. Whether I’m just going to work, or to the dentist, or meeting with friends, I usually get there on time. I don’t know how, but I do. I hate being late. And I hate it when people are late.

Somehow I seem to be one of very few people feeling this way. People don’t mind being late. They don’t apologize for it. They just try to go on as normal and if you were to mention something about it, they’d probably be angry with you!

I heard that its etiquette for royalty to be one hour late; obviously a lot of people think of themselves are royalty then! They tend to act like people are incredible honoured to meet with them!? I don’t mind if you have a serious rough morning (like a geyser bursts?) or just oversleep once in a while, but every single day, or every single time we meet for coffee is NOT COOL!!

If you know you’re prone to be late, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Get up one hour earlier, do the important things first, and if you have time you can still carry on with whatever else it is that normally throws you off schedule.

But please, for the sake of your friends, keep the appointments you make!

I told you when I first started with PayPerPost, and since then I’ve done six posts - that’s not much. But I’ve made just about $70 so far! Not too bad hey? I’ve tried SoulCast, Google and who knows what else, and so far, I don’t even have $70 combined from all those!

PayPerPost is really cool! I get to choose topics which I want to blog about, and get paid for it! There’s a brief approval stage, and you will get notified via e-mail if your post has been rejected, including the reason for it being rejected. You can then go and ammend the problem area, and resubmit your post! I have had a post rejected once, but only because I didn’t read the fine print well. They sometimes require to to have a disclaimer on your blog, which is what I had left out.
PayPerPost is straight forward, and even fun!

You can make money blogging too, just sign up, for free, and start posting. You will need to have a paypal account already, and you’ll have to have it activated for incoming funds too - not only outgoing as it is by default.
Once you’re setup, you’re good to go and get some $$!

Just a tip to all the South Africans. I know I’ve been struggling to find a good online map of South Africa, with street names and all the rest, so I’m sharing my latest discovery with you!

Check out Brabys Maps - you can type in the name of the street that you’re looking for, and on the map which is returned, your searched street name will be highlighted in green. Also you can do a “From - To” search, where you get your journey worked out for you - complete with a calculation of duration and distance to your destination, as well as speed limits in the various places you will be travelling through - fancy hey?

Tell me what you think

Preparation for parenthood is not just a matter of reading books and decorating the nursery. Here are 12 simple tests for expectant parents to take to prepare themselves for the real-life experience of being a mother or father.

1. Women: to prepare for maternity, put on a dressing gown and stick a beanbag chair down the front. Leave it there for 9 months. After 9 months, take out 10% of the beans.
Men: to prepare for paternity, go to the local drug store, tip the contents of your wallet on the counter, and tell the pharmacist to help himself. Then go to the supermarket. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office. Go home. Pick up the paper. Read it for the last time.

2. Before you finally go ahead and have children, find a couple who are already parents and berate them about their methods of discipline, lack of patience, appallingly low tolerance levels, and how they have allowed their children to run riot. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child’s sleeping habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behavior. Enjoy it — it’ll be the last time in your life that you will have all the answers.

3. To discover how the nights will feel, walk around the living room from 5pm to 10pm carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 8-12 lbs. At 10pm put the bag down, set the alarm for midnight, and go to sleep. Get up at 12 and walk around the living room again, with the bag, till 1am. Put the alarm on for 3am. As you can’t get back to sleep get up at 2am and make a drink. Go to bed at 2:45am. Get up again at 3am when the alarm goes off. Sing songs in the dark until 4am. Put the alarm on for 5am. Get up. Make breakfast. Keep this up for 5 years. Look cheerful.

4. Can you stand the mess children make? To find out, smear peanut butter onto the sofa and jam onto the curtains. Hide a fish stick behind the stereo and leave it there all summer. Stick your fingers in the flowerbeds then rub them on the clean walls. Cover the stains with crayons. How does that look?

5. Dressing small children is not as easy as it seems: first buy an octopus and a string bag. Attempt to put the octopus into the string bag so that none of the arms hang out. Time allowed for this: all morning.

6. Take an egg carton. Using a pair of scissors and a pot of paint turn it into an alligator. Now take a toilet tube. Using only scotch tape and a piece of foil, turn it into a Christmas candle. Last, take a milk container, a ping pong ball, and an empty package of Cocoa Pops and make an exact replica of the Eiffel Tower. Congratulations. You have just qualified for a place on the playgroup committee.

7. Forget the Miata and buy a Taurus. And don’t think you can leave it out in the driveway spotless and shining. Family cars don’t look like that. Buy a chocolate ice cream bar and put it in the glove compartment. Leave it there. Get a quarter. Stick it in the cassette player. Take a family-size packet of chocolate cookies. Mash them down the back seats. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car. There. Perfect.

8. Get ready to go out. Wait outside the toilet for half an hour. Go out the front door. Come in again. Go out. Come back in. Go out again. Walk down the front path. Walk back up it. Walk down it again. Walk very slowly down the road for 5 minutes. Stop to inspect minutely every cigarette butt, piece of used chewing gum, dirty tissue and dead insect along the way. Retrace your steps. Scream that you’ve had as much as you can stand, until the neighbors come out and stare at you. Give up and go back into the house. You are now just about ready to try taking a small child for a walk.

9. Always repeat everything you say at least five times.

10. Go to your local supermarket. Take with you the nearest thing you can find to a pre-school child — a fully grown goat is excellent. If you intend to have more than one child, take more than one goat. Buy your week’s groceries without letting the goats out of your sight. Pay for everything the goats eat or destroy. Until you can easily accomplish this do not even contemplate having children.

11. Hollow out a melon. Make a small hole in the side. Suspend it from the ceiling and swing it from side to side. Now get a bowl of soggy Wheeties and attempt to spoon it into the swaying melon by pretending to be an airplane. Continue until half the Wheeties are gone. Tip the rest into your lap, making sure that a lot of it falls on the floor. You are now ready to feed a 12-month-old baby.

12. Learn the names of every character from Barney and Friends, Sesame Street and The Power Rangers. When you find yourself singing Barney’s theme song, “I love you.. You love me…” at work, you finally qualify as a parent.

I got this e-mail from a friend, and couldn’t resist posting