Can I have your attention please? Testing...

I'm busy test driving a new (2nd hand) laptop. I've been itching to get one but have not had the funds to go the whole hog and purchase one. The only way that I would be able to take on this challenge would be to get one at a really cheap price - or do a swop out with one of my friends. I have a spare computer that I haven't been using to its full potential. So a test drive on the laptop is now in order.

I have to make use of this opportunity...I live in a house with another guy. His dad owns the house - he is however not here very often. He works abroad in Angola. Anyhow...the hours that my housemate keeps leaves much to be desired. Don't get me wrong. I don't really mind or care that he comes in from town at 2 in the morning. Just don't bring the rest of town with you when you come home...during the week!!!! Some people!

Last week I spent 2 days testing our model boat on a dam near Mooreesberg. The dam is called Misverstanddam. The name is quite apt. One would easily mistake this dam for a short river. After our first day of testing we decided to see how long the dam really is. Its about 17km long. We travelled for about 15km and thought that we had pretty much reached the end. Also, we didn't trust the fuel gauge on the boat - it wasn't dropping at all during our entire day's worth of moving around! :) The testing was quite a lot of fun. We even had a bit of drama during the eveing when we discovered that one of the engine bays had pretty much filled up with water. We're working with electric motors here. And as most people will tell you: "Water and electricity don't mix!!" We had a small fire in the engine compartment. This smoked one of the motor controllers. There goes R2500. The aftermath left quite a bit of mess. We promptly sealed every single hole and crack or percieved crack with silicone the next morning.

Marisa has convinced me to start growing a beard. Not too sure what she sees in it, but while she encourages this little bit of laziness I'm not going to complain!! Its been going for just over 2 weeks now. Will have to see what it looks like closer to my birthday next month - next weekend!!

Sleep well all of you!! I'm off to dreamland.

And the month steps on!!

A lot has happened in the last month. Adriaan has come and gone. Job offers were made and rejected. Wedding plans are still busy being made and Marisa's mom is now in London. An international phone call came through enquiring whether we wanted cream serviettes with flowers on...from Harods!! :)

It would seem that a lot more dedication is required in keeping the masses updated on the events in my life! I was made a job offer for a company in Cape Town. Always good to know that you're sought after. Here I go blowing my own horn!! The fact that I was about to leave did seem to have some sort of positive effect at the place where I currently work. So perhaps it all happened for a good reason.

So far our wedding plans (those that have been completed/confirmed) include the venue, a dressmaker (Marisa's mom), the photographer and the pastor who's going to perform the ceremony. Although the pastor is semi-doubtful. He still has to let us know. Have to sort that out asap - reminder to self!! There may be some more items that I have forgotten and I'm sure I'll be reminded about them sure enough!! :) We started going to marriage preparation seminars about 3weeks ago. It been a lot of fun. You learn a lot and also quite about about the person you are marrying. Our church organises the seminars twice a year. I would definitively recommend it!

The potential project that I was going to work on seems to have gotten underway. I'm busy downloading some software to use for the programming of the devices. Its quite exciting to be doing something that I've wanted to do for quite sometime. I have the creative freedom to do almost what I please. As long as it stays within budget - which is small by the way!! :) Its quite a challenge. I have to do the concept design, physical design, PCB layout (I might outsource the actual building though - surface-mount stuff is too fiddly for me without the right tools!), as well as the firmware design!!

Marisa has been registering with quite a few of the bride/wedding sites. Its actually very cute to see how excited she is. I'd be worried if that wasn't the case. Although if your woman isn't into all the cute stuff then I'm sure you'd still have some way to gauge whether the enthusiasm was there or not.

I've been getting quite a workout at work over the last month. I've been working at Spoornet in Bellville.We've developed a locomotive engine testing system. Besides all the behind the scenes troubles we've had with the project, I must admit that I do enjoy the change of scenery. I would like to get it finished though. To qualify the workout statement made earlier, the device (not really a very acurate description when one normally associates a device with a handheld item) is housed in a modified shipping container. So I have to climb and crawl all over the place to debug the circuits and to repair things if they blow up!

Tonight we're going to watch Pirates of the Caribbean 2. Should be very exciting!

Till later...