snowgoose

I’m a big Harry Potter fan. The ability to do magic is something I’ve always wanted, I’m sure all of us have. Right now, if I could, the magic I’d do is take my thoughts out of my head and pop them in a pensieve so I can relax for 15 frikken minutes without overthinking everything. Oh, look at that! I have a blog, my very own digital pensieve. I know that just cos I’m writing them down doesn’t mean I’ll stop thinking about them but maybe dumping them on a page will put them into some sort of order. Or maybe I’m just rambling again. So – here are the things running through my head right now, in no particular order:

I wish I had money, not that I was rich (we all want that) but just enough to not have to buy clothes at Mr Price and always look at the prices for everything, from the pasta to my makeup – and choose the cheapest one. I wish I didn’t have to look at the clothes in Woolies and Jenni Button wistfully and walk past.

Is my hair falling out? I lose way more hair than I used to and it freaks me out, even though the hairdresser tells me not to worry. Is it falling out cos I dye it every month? Should I go back to blonde? And if I did, how much would that cost?

Am I ever going to grow the willpower to stay relatively slim without having to see the dietician and go to the gym all the time? To not always eat the chips, the biltong, the big portion of pasta. Some people just know when to stop eating. I don’t.

I’m so damn behind at work all the time. I am really trying but I know if I buckle down and force myself to, I can work even harder and get caught up. The only problem is, when I do that, other things suffer. Like my home life and my health. I need to find a balance – does a balance even exist?

If my neighbours’ dogs don’t shut up soon I’m going to drop-kick them.

I’m jealous that one of my best friends has just bought a house with a garden and higher walls than mine (i.e.: more privacy). I’m really happy for her but that doesnt make me any less jealous.

I spend almost every day swinging between a sense of contentment and gratitude for my amazing life and a mild sense of panic that everything is slipping (it’s not, my brain knows that but sometimes my brain switches off).

If my stupid neighbour doesn’t stop playing that hideous loud music soon I’m going to drop kick the other neighbours’ dog into his head.

Damn I love being a QuirkStar. I don’t actually care how much I repeat it. I love it. It makes me smile just thinking about it.

I think I may have anger management issues. I rarely blow up but I get irritated very quickly and I’m a tad confrontational (a tad?!?)

I kind of miss B. I don’t miss that place but she is so awesome and I miss her. I miss the Magna girls too.

Shaun looks really cute when he naps, like a little boy. He curls up and gets this really peaceful look on his face. He’d get mildly annoyed if he knew I was blogging about this, oh well, hi babe!

I wonder how my baby sister is. Not what she’s doing or how her job is going. How is she? Is she OK? Does she go to sleep smiling or crying? Or does she just collapse from the exhaustion of maintaining 2 jobs and a relationship?

Oh, wow, the neighbours’ dogs and the other neighbours have both shut up… and I didn’t even notice. rad.

I must remember my dad’s birthday next week. I must remember my dad’s birthday next week. I’ll put it in the calender.

Damn, I wish I hadn’t lost touch with the beautician that I did the design work for and got beauty treatments as payment. I only used one of the treatments and my toes look like something off a gargoyle but it’s too late to claim my owed treatments now – I missed the damn boat.

Do they prefer to be called beauticians, health and skincare professionals or what? And is it offensive to call them beauticians?

Even though I bitch and moan about all the Snow Leaopard talk this week, I (not so) secretly want a mac. Not cos they are pretty and shiny. Cos I started working on one when I was a designer and Windows will never really come close. Mostly, I want it for the battery power, I hate having to plug things in every few minutes. I wish we could have wireless power.

Gawd, my damn phone just beeped again. I hate having a phone. For the internet it is awesome, but phone callls and, lately SMSes and emails, I could do without. There I go getting irritated again.

I suspect that flippen tomcat from down the road has come into my house and pee’d somewhere. Now I have to go and get the “P-OFF” spray and hunt around in a crouch sniffing everything until I find the pee so I can eradicate it. Damn, how undiginified, sniffing for cat piss on a Saturday afternoon.

I wonder if the fact that I talk so much is irritating? Do people listen or do they just switch off and think “Flippen hell Heidi, please just shut the hell up for 2 minutes!” Probably the latter, but I can’t stop talking. It wouldn’t happen if I could control it. duh!

I wonder if I have arthritis. I’m a bit too scared to call the doctor to get the blood test results. Would it even make a major difference to my life? Of course it would. Flippen hell I’m scared. I hope I’m being paranoid. If I am, I’ll be very annoyed that I wasted over R1000 on blood tests I cant claim from Medical Aid (long story).

Sjoe, this blog post is getting long now, half the readers have probably left to go do something more important. Sorry for you if you read this far down – that’s 5 minutes of your life you won’t get back!

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You may have heard the rumour that it is my mission to convert ordinary people into geeks. Even though my hatchling series is temporarily absent, I still believe firmly in this. I don’t intend to make every person on the planet into a mac-toting, publicity loving, browser aficianado – What I want is for every person I meet to see the internet, and her possibilities, like I do… limitless. The only problem with my passion is that geeks are a tiny subsection of society – less than 2%, so… how do we spread our message? We’d need someone to create some sort of recognised internet marketing course. Not a 3 day conference, an actual, affordable, certified, supported course.

It seems that Quirk and GetSmarter have done just that. Between them they are presenting an 8 week, distance learning course in eMarketing. The course is based on the super-easy-to-read Quirk eMarketing textbook, already in it’s 2nd Edition, it’s the only eMarketing textbook in South Africa and one of only a handful in the world. (just ask Seth Godin). The cool thing about this course is you actually learn something. Too many certificate courses (and even some degrees!) in South Africa teach you absolutely nothing and have no practical application. So you have a masters in Philosophy? Whoopdie frikken doo. And you can apply what you’ve learned immediately, and you can see the results almost immediately too.

Another cool part is it’s cheap: R5 600. Now I know that sounds like a lot of money but education is expensive, there are some 2 day courses out there that cost twice that!! (no kidding, I checked). You could get a loan if you can’t find the cash – it’s your education so it’s borrowing money to gain a valuable asset.

Have I convinced you? Will you become part of the Geek-squad? (how flippin geeky am I?) Learn more on GottaQuirk or GetSmarter’s website.

Lastly, I am not writing this post because Quirk asked me to, they didn’t. I have been passionate about Digital Education for a long time, Quirk shares my passion and it is one of the reasons I chose to work here.

I mean, c’mon… what other agency do you know of that has written a 400 page textbook?

After reading my last post, I realise it may have sounded pretty negative. Damn, amazing how a sore throat and a blocked up nose can make one a real grumposaurus!

As hectic as it is, I still LOVE what I do and wouldn’t trade it for the world. My trip to Cape Town was actually really cool now that I can think back without feeling like goose-poop.

For starters, I got to salsa at Chris M’s birthday – I learned I actually don’t have 2 left feet – and I got to see some great tweeps, Sue, Bev & Marcel at the party.

I also spoke on SEO in front of my biggest audience (adult audience, speeches done at school don’t count) yet at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology’s ONline Media Conference. (P.S. If you ever get an invite to speak at this annual conference, grab it. I have been to looooads of conferences and this is one of the most organised and slick I’ve ever seen!)

After a mad rush to the airport I flew back to Joburg to atttend the wedding of 2 very dear friends of ours and I am so glad I was there to see it. Here is a really cool pic that Shaun took of the couple’s first dance:

And if all this excitement wasn’t enough for you – I flew back to Cape Town in Sunday. On Monday I met the Cape Town QuirkStars, most of them for the first time. They rock! What an awesome, funky bunch of people. Seeing the new QuirkStation was also super cool – I’m helluva jealous though, wouldn’t you be if you knew your colleagues were looking at this every day?:

To top it all off, the incomparible Gaby Rosario took me out for dinner on Monday night and we had a fab dinner with @BlindCripple, Shawn Jooste, Ann Wilson and Marcel.

So, dear reader, I ask that you forgive the previous mumblings of my medicated brain…

Life is still good great flippin’ fantastic!

This weekend I was lucky enough to travel to The 2009 Durban July on behalf of a client: South African Tourism.

Recently, Metro FM ran a competition where people could win an all expenses paid 5 day trip to Durban for them and 3 friends. The trip included Shark Diving, Ziplining through the Oribi Gorge and a day at Africa’s Greatest Horse-racing event; The Durban July. We were tasked with recording their experiences and publishing them online on:

• The Celebrate South Africa Blog
• The @ShotLeft twitter stream
• The South African Tourism Flickr stream
• The South African Tourism YouTube channel

Things I learned this weekend:

Durbanites are amazing peeps

Everyone was so friendly and the city has a great, bohemian party vibe. We met some fantastic people and my opinion of the city that was formed in my childhood (Slightly dingy holiday town full of surfers) was seriously challenged. Durban also has loads of fashion designers, from the fledgling ones starting their careers to some of the most respected designers in SA.

The Durban July is not actually about horses

It’s about seeing and being seen in the latest fashions. I saw the blondest hair and the darkest tans I’ve seen in a while. Some of the people looked fantastic – but mostly they just looked plastic. The main race was at 16h30 and the majority of the 56 000 people at Greyville racecourse didn’t even bat an eyelid when the horses thundered down the straight. Some of them didn’t even leave their Marquees!

I did have a good laugh at the girls who started off the day in their insanely high stilettos looking like they just stepped off the catwalk and ended it rather drunk, their make-up smudged and their feet in excruciating pain. As much as it wasn’t exactly my normal scene, I did enjoy all the people-watching and I’m very glad I went.

Kwazulu Natal has some awesome tourist destinations!

I’ve been going to KZN on holiday at least once a year since I was a kid and not once had I ever been to the awesome Aquarium at uShaka Marine World, see the Umzimkulu River Valley on the South Coast or the breath-taking Oribi Gorge. Next time I find myself there, I’m definitely doing the Wild Swing at Oribi Gorge – it’s a King Swing down a 100m drop!! Radness!

So, even though it was a working weekend – I had a great time and learned a lot. Go have a look at our photos, videos (still busy being uploaded) & blog posts to see what we did.

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I’ve been true to my word this week, I’ve blogged here and on GottaQuirk. The post on the latter took quite a bit of research and here it is, tell me what you think:

Two well known South African websites have recently undergone face-lifts, one more successfully than the other.

Nando’s, one of my favourite chicken fast-food outlets, have gone the ‘aesthetics first, award-winning’ route. They have a full flash site with a non-standard experiential navigation.

When the craving for Nando’s awesome peri-peri wings hits, I need to satisfy it immediately so I usually turn to Google to help me find the nearest branch. Considering that about 60% of Internet users begin their browsing with a Google search, Search engine friendliness is a fundamentally important part of any company’s online presence….

Want to read more? See the full post here.