I read on News24.com that 50% of matriculants last year actually passed, of which only 7% will find jobs. So extrapolating that out, 96.5% of all matriculants will be unemployed.

Something to think about if you're planning to drop maths and / or science. If you do, you're just another dumbass tomcruise.

A lot of things bug me (we all have issues, I guess), but when someone who runs a business like TurboCASH gets defensive and rude when I threaten legal action after my numerous requests to be removed from a mailing list go unanswered, this is the last straw.

Philip Copeman, of TurboCASH, refuses to speak to me. His last email said "leave me alone" when I asked how hard it was to read a simple request to be removed from a mailing list.

Philip Copeman, of TurboCASH, a company he runs in his own name, is hereby named and shamed, since the other people I've been in contact with have not been authorised to represent him.

Here are the details as provided to me, should I wish to take legal action against TurboCASH (run by Philip Copeman) for breaking the law by ignoring numerous requests to be removed from a mailing list.

Philip Copeman (remember, he runs TurboCASH)
5612275062088
Box 12728, 15 Cabernet Way
High Steenberg
Tokai
7945

A screen capture from News24.com:

The second crowd who can't seem to understand unsubscription requests is Sahara Computers. As in my previous incident with TurboCASH, I was receiving four copies of all their sales news. This is usually about ten emails a week, on average, including a price list exceeding 500KB. So, when the price list is sent out, I get over 1.5MB of spam.

I say spam, because I've asked them on at least two occasions to remove the domain and so far, nothing.

I purchased a domain recently (in May 2008) that had just expired, and immediately started receiving emails from various newsletters that the previous owner had subscribed to. That was fine. I was able to find unsubscribe options in most cases, and was successful in all those cases. Except for two.

TurboCASH is the free alternative to Pastel and QuickBooks accounting software, and is maintained by Pink Software. I used it when it ran on DOS, and I used version 3 of the Windows version when I operated my own business. Naturally, I had my own subscription to their newsletter. Unfortunately, so did the previous owner of the domain I bought, as well as one of his staff members. I was getting the same email three times, every time.

I followed the instructions to unsubscribe, and received two confirmations, one for each address.

I did the same thing in June.

And July.

And August.

In September I just deleted the emails.

I got annoyed in October and sent their upstream ISPs an email respectfully requesting removal of emails to this new domain I bought. I received clear confirmation that it had been actioned.

Tonight I received thee more newsletters, two to the domain that was not supposed to get email anymore. I sent and email to everyone @ anywhere and will see what happens next.

---

EDIT: 22h03 - I got this reply after 21 minutes, on a Sunday night. Not bad.

---

Hi Randolph,

I have deleted you and have also discovered why previous deletions did not work. You appeared in our registered users as well as on our mailing list. Because of a shortcoming in our mailing program we had to delete the list and recreate it before sending.When it recreates the mailing list , it does so with reference to registered users , within which your were included.

I am certain that you appear on none now,
Kindly forgive the inconvenience,
Selwyn Wacks
Webmaster
Deleted Randolph

---

EDIT: 2008/11/28: Still getting spam. Obviously Selwyn Wacks is a tomcruise.

Good bye, and thank you for the music.

Ra-ra-ree
Kick her in the knee.
Ra-ra-runt
Kick her in the other knee.

"Vodafone, the world's biggest mobile phone group by revenue, announced on Thursday it had agreed to buy a further 15% stake in Vodacom from Telkom for R22.5bn, giving it control of the mobile operator."

See related link.

This is a transcript of Barack Obama's acceptance speech, taken from News24.com.

Hello, Chicago.

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It's the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference.
Read More...

Kaploes, kaploes,
die branders slaan op my knieë.
Ek weet dit rym nie,
maar ek wag vir hoogwater.

The page has received over 10 000 page views now.

stumbleupon.com (referral) 3,015 83.38%

The page that someone thought was cool enough? See the related link.

"Mylonite is a breccieated brecciated metamorphic rock frequently found in a fault zone".

Blame Scott Adams. He is recycling phrases now.

It's been a while, and I'm sorry I haven't posted anything. Work is insanely busy, and I forced myself *not* to work tonight. Home life just got interesting, with some prospects that will be taking a direction from 25 November. When that time comes, we will know a little better what's happening. And yes, I'm still extraordinarily happily married, so it's nothing to do with that!

P.S. I love my hubby more than ever.

But the political muppets dancing around and haphazardly spraying piss all over each other to mark their lucrative territories are not bright. And when I say not bright, I of course mean unbelievably fucking stupid. -- Chris Roper

See related link.

I have a new favourite insult, courtesy of today's Dilbert.

(See related link.)

My blog has 102 612 words, excluding this entry. In about ten years, I should have enough words to be equivalent to halfway through the first chapter of Stephen King's The Stand.

Equally as funny as the failed $700bn nationalisation of private US banks are the antics of the Ferrari F1 team on Sunday, during the first ever night race. I laughed out loud when Raikonnen crashed into the wall four laps from the end.

The US House of Representatives has defeated the $700bn emergency rescue package proposed to save their economy. I think it was Warren Buffet who said that if it doesn't go through, the market will go into a free-fall.

Did you hear that? It was the sound of millions of investors saying "Oh, shit!"

All of a sudden, I'm glad I left Nedbank when I did.

And rest in peace, Connie Haines, big band singer and Duchess of Idaho.

So long, and thanks for Butch Cassidy.

Seriously, they're staying? What happened to loyalty?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

And now Poison Ivy is running the country until the new guy is sworn in (Kgalema Motlanthe). I knew it would be a female, but Ivy? Heaven preserve us. At least it's only for 11 hours. What's the worst that could happen? ... Three hours left ...

At least Alec Erwin has quit. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

(Reproduced from the related link)

Cape Town - A statement issued by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu.

"I am deeply disturbed by recent events in our beloved county. The so-called recalling of the President of our land fits the pattern of the settling of scores and the throwing about of weight that has happened post-Polokwane.

" Why sack two Premiers with only a few months of their terms left to run and then to re-employ one of them in the Presidency if it is not to prove that there are new cocks of the walk?

"Why humiliate the nation's President in this fashion like the two Premiers with only a few months of his term of office left and that without giving him the chance to respond to any charges that the NEC might have laid?

"Ironically one of the reasons Judge Nicholson declared Mr Jacob Zuma's indictment invalid was that the NPA had not afforded him the right to explain why he should not be charged.

"President Mbeki has scored many significant achievements in our economy and in promoting peace in Africa, most recently in Zimbabwe. But he has made many enemies even within his party for his intolerance of challenges and dissent. South Africa puzzled many of our friends by odd foreign policy decisions that betrayed our history on his watch. Those enemies have got their revenge and are gloating as they rub his nose in the mud.
Read More...

See related link.

"Spokesperson James Gillies says experts have gone into the Large Hadron Collider to examine the damage that halted operations soon after the start-up."

... And haven't been seen since.

And in other completely unrelated news, no one in this timeline has heard of Jesus Christ, and Arnold Schwarzenegger is president of USA.

The ANC has announced that Thabo Mbeki is to be recalled as president of the country.

The deputy president said she would go if Mbeki left, so it looks like the Speaker of the House will be sworn in as acting president.

Jacob Zuma cannot be president unless he is a Member of Parliament.

From TFA (see related link):

"Free State ANC chief whip Playfair Morule has been fined R36 000 or 12 months' imprisonment for killing a man in a hit-and-run accident."

Don't you just love his name?

I've updated my poetry page (see related link) with some pieces I found on my phone.

I like the song-like "Feel The Love", and the words in "Hungry For You". "Penelope-Anne" is meant to shock, and it does. "My Life For You" feels unfinished, but I liked how it sounded, so it's up there all the same.

In December last year, I predicted that Jacob Zuma's court case, set for 14 August 2008, would be struck off the roll or delayed. Last week, his application for having the current charges ruled unlawful, was successful. The National Prosecuting Authority was found to have been influenced politically. Interesting times ahead for our outgoing president. There's even talk of impeachment.

Meanwhile, said president is trying to placate the rest of the world over the Zimbabwe issue. The deal he brokered between Mugabe and Everyone Else is mostly pointless, but it's a good start. How quickly we forget that it took a long time for South Africa to get from CODESA to President Mandela.

In other news, FIFA's own president has stated that the 2010 Soccer World Cup is still going ahead in South Africa, and Zuma's likely election as SA president should not have any influence on this momentous occasion.

I'm not a soccer fan, so I don't really care either way, but I am very interested in the Gautrain's progress. The TBMs are making good progress, the airport's station is complete, and all signs point towards a high-speed rail link being finished according to schedule.

Work continues unabated. I have been at my new job for four and a half months now, and they're making me earn my money. I'm working on several projects concurrently, but the most important one is for a major financial institution, where I have designed the database and batch processing engine. I'm very excited and nervous about the whole thing. We're using SQL 2005 in a clustered environment, blade hardware, Windows 2008, Hyper-V, a Java-based decision engine, WCF, Windows Workflow back-end, and some very creative C# code.

This blog has also been modified now with some Feedburner ads, to see if I can increase my AdSense revenue. I upgraded my hosting solution about a month ago, and I need to make enough to cover my costs.

There's also a relaunch of a site in my stable coming soon, hopefully with enough appeal to drive traffic (and click-throughs) through the roof, and allow me to focus on how to spend my fortune.

Should reality hit harder than this dream, I have other plans up my sleeve. I've been poor once before, and I now have a husband, a house and two dogs to take care of.

Sunday was our one year wedding anniversary, and I'm looking forward to the rest of our life together. Yay!