Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Ok....

So I'm going to vent....

I'm driving to work this morning...(I generally leave at around 6:30 to miss the traffic)...and as some may know I try my best to take traffic in my stride...my feeling is to best just get to wherever you want to go in a good mood than let traffic destroy your day...

Anyways, im driving along and I turn onto the Rivonia onramp.....even at 6:50 the traffic is still fairly full so there is no point in rushing...you can only go as fast as the broken truck in front of it all....so all the cars slowly start tidying up into a nice neat line (you have traffic turning onto the onramp from both sides)....one car from the left, one car from the right...you know, even stevens....that is until we encounter prickhead in his new black golf GTI...

Now you see everybody else on the road realises that traffic is traffic and well, its all about queuing really....if you are in front of the person...well then you are in front of the person, its quite a simple concept....prickhead GTI on the other hand tries to and would've succeeded into pushing me off the road and into the verge to get passed ??? ....now normally I would've just submitted (this is a common practice nowadays by BMW and 4x4 drivers) but today I just thought you cheeky bastard, put foot and took my rightful place in the queue....

Now this is where it gets interesting....and this is where the psychology of humans still sometimes eludes me....we are now on the highway and he pulls up next to me, asking or more voicing angrily (I had the windows up and we were doing 100km/h) "what was my problem ??? "...now im sure this would've been a simple thing for prickhead to comprehend....after all he does have a brand new black golf GTI...surely you would need to have a job of some sophistication to earn enough to afford a car like that ??? surely he could've figured out for himself that he was trying to push into the queue and run me off the road !!! .....I just sighed and shook my head....at 6:50 (now) in the morning I really didn't need a conflict...hell I haven't even had my coffee yet...he hovered around for a couple of seconds and then sped off like only a new black golf GTI can...

I'll be honest...it left me a bit shook up...growing up on the east rand quickly teaches you not to mess around with anyone....the smallest blighter can have a bunch of cronies standing around the corner or the most unsuspecting dude will have a reputation of being a rapist and somebody who wont blink twice to stab you in the throat with a beer glass....so I generally try to avoid conflict like the plague....rule number one....if they approach or try to antagonise you , theres generally a reason for it...and most of the time its because the person in question is slightly unbalanced...I mean for fuck sakes, its 6:50 in the morning...who in their right mind wants to fight then ??? anyways...

So then we move along to something that has been on my mind for awhile....and this is the status symbol that cars represent...i.e. if you drive a BMW, 4x4 or a new black golf GTI , you are obviously better than the rest on the road purely because you can afford a "luxury" car...

Now just to clear up some things...I like my car, I own a little Hyundai Atoz (jokes asides :o) ..and its black I might add)...and I love it....it does everything I need a car to do...it has power steering, electric windows, central locking, is incredibly light on fuel and more importantly...its tiny...I spend nearly everyday of my life in traffic, and this car is a traffic car...the gear ratios work well and although its not the fastest car on the planet, it has a fast acceleration and it'll get me to 140 quite comfortably...which for me is all I need....it may not be the prettiest but its a car for fuck sakes and it just needs to get you from A to B effectively...

I've never seen the need to buy a "luxury" vehicle to upgrade my image...I would much rather spend that disposable income saved on gear and toys...stuff that would give me way more pleasure in the long run...that's not to say that I disagree with people owning "luxury" cars....if it turns you on then great...but I personally don't give a fuck whether you drive a Toyota bakkie from 10 years ago or the latest and greatest black golf GTI...really your status symbol is wasted on me...

I appreciate people for who they are not for what they drive....anybody (and prickhead proves this), provided they have enough credit can buy a BMW, 4x4, or new black shiny GTI....these cars do not, and I repeat, do not make you more intelligent...they are just shells with a motor in them...given some are prettier than others but strip them down and they all look the same inside...I know, I studied to be a motor mechanic...

I have a mate that owns a new white shiny 3 series...all his money goes into the car yet he rents a room in a commune ?! ...if that's what turns him on then so be it...but you wont get anymore respect out of me because you own that car....its superficial and in the long run its a material object that can get taken away from you as fast as you got it....afterall....its very rare that unless you purchased the car cash, you actually own it....the bank owns it until then...you miss a payment, guess what, they will take it back...so if you would rather kill yourself with debt just to own a car like that, then thats your baby...

So now why do peeps who drive these cars think that they deserve more respect ??? ....do they think that because they have attained a car like this that they have climbed that little bit higher up the social ladder ??? I find it sad, because at the end of the day its just a misconception being driven by the motor industry...."get this car and you will be seen as this", (even if you can just afford it and live in a shack on the edge of Thembisa....)

For now I'll stick to my little Hyundai Atoz.... :o) she has done me well for the last year and after 2 more years I'll probably buy a little white bakkie (more space is needed for gigs now) and I just may get a 1200...wOOt !!!

P.S. (I do appreciate Lamborghini's, Aston Martin's and Ferrai's, strangely though you dont find these peeps driving like pricks...funny that)

New Studio Pics

I love blogger... :o)

And a lot of the reason is because I can post up my pics without having to go thru the whole FTP routine with my site to upload pics....I can just use the links on other forums and its no mess, no fuss....i should probably use flickr but hey, I want to post on the blog as well... :o)

So heres some new studio pics if anybody is interested....this is my home studio, its fairly modest but...its all mine unlike the studio setup at work which isnt...

Owning a studio is like owning a pet....every once in awhile you have the nightmare of having to clean up (wires become a rats nest after awhile, no clue why as they dont move by themselves)...they tend to grow continually with new bits of gear being added along the way, which means more wires and more thought process needed to get it all to actually work in a symbian relationship...the PCs need to talk to each other, the synths need to talk to the PCs, the controllers need to talk to both the PCs and the synths etc etc....this is probably what I love most about studio's....having to rewire it all once a new piece of kit arrives :oP (a geek I know)

My setup consists of 2 parts...

^^^

A main workstation, most of the tracks get written on this....

^^^

And the live workstation, this is what we use to rehearse and play live on (which needs to be easily taken apart and packed into small little bags so that we can actually gig)...

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Heres the full setup :o)

^^^

These are my babies....

Both are about 25 years old...both are analogue and both make the biggests sounds you can imagine....that little one that looks like a Casio keyboard is called a Yamaha CS01 and is responsible for most of the basslines that went into the early jungle and dnb stuff....its popularity waned a bit when rave kicked in but now that electro is in this little synth is a monster... :o)

The Juno60 (the big one) is my fav....she was born in 1985 and still has the most lush sounds you can imagine...I will never get rid of her ever....now I just needs some more playmates....a Korg Wavestation is one the cards (c1991), a wavetable synth that is just begging me to buy her and then hopefully my gear lust will be curbed...(altho a SH101 and a Moog would be nice to haves)

The synth on the workstation side (I shouldve taken a bigger picture) is a Yamaha PSS680 (my very 1st synth bought in 1996)...she was a cheapy but has an evil FM (frequency modulated) character that I love...she also taught me a lot about synthesis....I circuit bent(basically rewiring the internals) her a couple months back to eek out a little more nastiness...currently she is also a midi controller and strangely gets used more than the other 2... :o)

And thats it....I know some may not find this interesting but this is what rocks my world :o)

Quote of the day.

Having someone dump you and say "We can still be friends"
Is like having your mom say "Your dog died but you can still keep it"

Traffic...

In the last week or 2 I have seriously had to learn how to curb my temper as far as road rage is concerned....some days its taking me as much as an hour and 45 minutes to get to work....an hour and 45 minutes !!! and I live 25km's from where I work ?! thats just ridiculous !?

But I now let people cut me off, stop in front of me, ride in the middle of the road etc...theres just no point to trying to fight it...all that happens is you get to work or home in a filthy mood and for what ??? for traffic.... ??? its just a waste of energy...

So when I drive to work now I try to look at the prettier things in life, pay attention to the trees you've never looked at (while still observing the road obviously), listen to good tunes (essential for this process) etc...notice the details and just let the idiots get on with what they want to do and move forward...they are like flies, they only bother you for a little while or if you let them :o)

Oh and I still carry mace in my car just in case... :oP

Yay for gays !!!

We are now proudly one of the only 5 countries in the world that allows same sex marriages and more importantly the same rights that heterosexual's get....the bill still needs to be approved by parliament's second house, the National Council of Provinces, and signed into law by President Thabo Mbeki, within the next two weeks to meet the deadline set by the Constitutional Court. (according to IOL daily) But I think all should go swimmingly...this put a big smile on my face...though I very much doubt any of my gay friends will actually ever marry... :oP

On another note....Zuma ??? is he in or is he out ???...can someone please clear this up for me... ??? if Zuma has gone it will be a day for celebration :o)

And then we have Yengeni ?! wtf....so commit fraud, get sent to prison where you get "breaks" so that you can spend time with your family ??? I mean come on....this has probably got to be the biggest load of crap ive ever heard in my entire life...and then the sucker still had the nerve to get in late... ??? man, when I grow up I want to be an ANC official.. :O)

You know in some ways, the ANC has been monumental in South Africa...liberation to people that never had it but in other ways they are just slowly destroying a beautiful country....what stuns me is how stuff is being allowed to happen when everybody can clearly see that there is something wrong with the system...personally I think that it all goes deeper than what we see or hear and that is why things just get swept under the mat...too many officials are involved in corruption and too many will go down if one does....but when is it going to end if ever ??? and how do we as a nation fight it ???

And then there is the whole sad mess in the DRC...this can only really work if one party accepts the other, otherwise what is the point of having elections in the 1st place ??? ....elections being made possible in the DRC was a monumental thing and I actually smiled when I heard this....but there's no point if nobody is going to take losing like a man...very sad and more innocent people will die because of it...

Blogger, I have sinned...

its been almost 2 weeks since my last post...

Ok so I know its been awhile, but there has been a perfectly good explanation for this...I've been happy and going about my way :o)...in a sense its almost been rather bland on the emotional front but that's a good thing im thinking...

So what's happened in the last 2 weeks....our gig, which personally I thought didn't go down to well...the sound on stage was horrendous and our vocalist was drunk...most said they didn't notice but I did and that doesn't sit too well with me....in essence its our 2nd gig and I really shouldn't be this hard on myself or the band but it just comes naturally to a perfectionist...I want it right every time and I wont be happy if its not...that's just the way I am...

Moving along, aforementioned girl has moved out...this has probably been the best thing to happen to me since she arrived in the country....trouble is a nice word for her, I could use a lot worse but I have decided not to hold grudges so that we can both move forward with our lives....it was great seeing her leave....bye now and not even a hug... :op strange that you can feel so little for someone after you have shared so much but this is the 1st girl ive ever felt like this about...personally I don't see it as a bad thing...

I slammed my finger in the door....for those that don't know, I managed to sever my tendon on my middle finger of my left hand after a rather rough nite at the Red Room....I'm still trying to figure out how but the closest I can get to is that it got caught in my belt somehow....truthfully I cant remember, after 2 weeks I noticed the finger still wasn't kosher so I went to the doc..."you gonna need a pin in there my dear boy"...dammed...I hate hospitals, I hate needles, I hate those starched beds....and then I slam the sucker in the door 4 weeks later.....it was so hard I thought I had actually bent the pin....so back to the doc, the verdict, only bruised...

I have been seeing a lot of Charlie lately...I don't know what is happening there...last sat we ended up at the Cellardoor and she was holding me so tightly it was incredible....now Charlie is not the kind of girl to even hug someone so im not exactly sure what it all means...she came back to my house and slept on the couch (I did offer her my bed bot to no avail)...so a bit confused there to be honest but I wont tread to much down that road....we have had this scenario before and it just ended in heartache for me so im not wanting to do it again...

Its weird how when you are not really interested in girls they come crawling out the woodwork....a girl, Ms T phoned me on Sunday....a sweet sweet thing that I met the nite I decided to sever my tendon....she just phoned out of the blue looking for a flat and maybe a nite out ??? huh ??? although we had a slight conversation on the nite it was nothing tremendously exciting...im not saying I don't mind but that was a bit of a surprise :oO

Otherwise life has just been ticking...got some time off next week mainly cos work owes me too much time so its a long weekend for me so im looking forward to that and that's about it for now... :o)

Glad to see some of my blogger friends are all together again, Champs is back online and Jam is happy again...that makes me happy :o)

Laters alligators