musings

Five years ago today, I stepped down as MD of the Yired group of companies and Chief Executive of YFM. It was a symbolic departure date exactly 10 years to the day I had started, 10 April 2007...

I have a particular point of personal pain in this sixth decade of my life — the number of books that are being pulled from libraries.

Got a shared video today via WhatsApp (as one does); security cam footage shows the inside of a barbershop, patrons having their haircuts.

Two gunmen enter, ten shots are fired into the head of a customer, they flee the scene.

“This jst happened in Umhlanga” said the forwarder.

Within minutes, I can see this is going viral. It’s popping up on people’s WhatsApp status messages. Meanwhile, I’m checking it out because forwarding videos without fact-checking is something I try not to do.

This has been at the back of my mind ever since the Will Smith / Chris Rock incident last week. This is an except from Ayn Rand's "The Fountainhead" which remains one of the most influential books in my life to this day,

Today's from Moneyweb : "Take note if you are conducting a business from your private residence — Ratepayers must comply with their zoning provisions."

So I hop across to Moneyweb. Story reads:

One of the things that my mother and I have in common (apart from the fact that 50 percent of my genes come from her) is our love of certain writers.

Peter O'Donnell,  creator of  Modesty Blaise, is probably at the top of the list. Less well known is that O'Donnell also wrote gothic historical romance novel under the female pseudonym  Madeleine Brent.

This is a transcript of my off-the-cuff thoughts on this subject on the Liberty and Friends show last week.

I had a rare opportunity to spend three weeks in Harare, Zimbabwe between February and March. Here are some things I learned.

Seasonal rainfall is huge concern for most Zimbabweans because almost every person I encountered is into farming.

Relatively small patches of land are used for planting maize and sugar beans, which means that late or failing rains have consequences.

Poultry farming is ubiquitous.

One can order egg incubators and have them delivered to your home.

A high-school friend who is a singer / songwriter shared a new composition with our class group yesterday. It's a very catchy jingle with its core theme in the chorus:

Is it one God or some religion

That everybody needs

Or do we shake those shackles off

And use reason as our belief

... online meetings have become a thing for even obscure corners of the world.