A few days ago I decided it is time to start another small company called Photudio. I have been interested in photography since I was a little boy running around with my Vivitar 35mm point and shoot film camera.

The web site contains some photos from each portfolio I like to take pictures for. Since I am interested in many different subjects, I have created distinct portfolios. Commercially I prefer doing Weddings, Model Portfolios, Still life and family portraits.

I hope this will become a viable company since I love photographing beauty...

Some freak decided tonight that it is a good idea to submit about 40 SPAM comments on my blog, distributed evenly across the blog entries... I had to delete them all one by one over an HSCSD (28.8kbps) connection.

The only temporary remedy I could find is to turn comments off. If you know of any way to work around this, please email me!

It has been quite a while since I last posted here. The reason is that we have just moved to a new townhouse, and Telkom does not yet have any lines available in the complex so I am without ADSL :(

The burglar alarm installation went well bar the misconception regarding the time it took to have installed it. After a week of struggling I got it in and fully working - finally! There were 22 cables I had to pull through the roof, which was no easy job...

So you are interested in the performance of the system? I love the Optex sensors, they work brilliantly. So far I only had two false alarms - one from an unknown source in the dining room, and one from the garage where my cat was locked in.

A while ago I had a security company (whose name I will not mention - for now) install a burglar alarm system for my new home. As I was not technically clued up on the vast array of different options and choices one have with purchasing an alarm system, I made a grave mistake. I asked advise from the security company on what I should purchase.

My experiences thus far always pointed back to the one fact, that most security companies do not know anything more than what is written on the side print of the boxes the alarm system components get delivered in. Since I make a point of going on to the Internet before I purchase anything of value, I am usually clued up more than the sales people! In this case I did not consult the Internet since I could not really find useful information.

To come back to my opening statement, the reason I said I made a grave mistake is that they did an absolutely pathetic job. I will not go into all the details, just those most applicable. Firstly, nobody asked me in detail how my house is laid out, whether I need perimeter protection or not, explain the different kind of sensors etc. They assumed an 8-zone IDS system would suffice. I specifically asked for an outdoor sensor since I knew I wanted perimeter detection, so that was added to the list. In the end everything got installed but now I have several issues:

Maybe I am too headstrong, but I have found that QoS (Quality of Service) - in this country at least - is absolutely pathetic.

As an example, take my car. I took it in for a service about three weeks ago. For the service I mentioned that I experienced an intermittent vibration when the car is idling. They duly jotted this down and said they'll have a look (my car is still under guarantee). That afternoon (after I phoned them - they forgot to phone me) they informed me that they had to order some parts (cannot remember what exactly) since they did not have it in stock and that was causing the vibrations. As I am a quite understanding person, I accepted this and booked my car for the next week.

Come the following week, I took my car in and later that afternoon I received a call that it was ready and all fixed. Happy about this I drove through to Pretoria and picked up my car. I barely drove 10 meters when I immediately realised the window was not working anymore - at least the automatic mode where you push the button for a second and it keeps moving until it is either closed or open. I had to keep the button depressed. I took it back only to hear the technician make a comment about the window being like that when he worked on it this morning. So I asked him whether he implied I broke it? He just mumbled.