Online dating profiles

That was a fun exercise. A friend got some info about a mutual contact, who apparently, has a profile on a dating site. My friend wanted this confirmed so I, being the female, agreed to create a profile and skulk around the site to see if we could establish some evidence. I was ready to stalk the men of Gauteng. The last time I did this, I found 2 work colleagues and a family member so I deleted myself and never ventured back. I logged on yesterday and these are my findings:-

I really think guys out there need some help. You are clearly, mostly-clueless about photos and they are your means of attracting a person, and getting them to want to find out more about you. A photo taken from under your chin and up your nostrils is not the smartest pose.  Please look at the camera, a sideways glance into the future makes me wonder what the other side of your face looks like.

A photo with you and your wife confuses me, especially your wedding photo! You and any lady, arm in arm, is going to raise questions that you probably won't get the opportunity to answer.

When you and two buddies are in the same picture, do I guess which one is you, or do I get all 3 of you?

Photos of you displaying the fish you caught are not appropriate, nor are photos of kids, what is that? You are marketing yourself, and then I must want to meet you based on a photo of,(hopefully), your own kids or grandkids. Photos with you and kids are just weird on a dating site.

If you are taking a selfie, don't do it in the mirror so I can see you holding the phone, that and not being able to perform a simple photo crop, drops your IQ by 20 in my books.  Clear black and white photos stand out nicely from the blurry, nostril pose that seems to be favored by red-faced sweaty blokes with nauseating nicknames.

I never did get to find the person we were stalking, but we had some good laughs and have hopefully helped someone to find a partner using a better profile photo. I intend to create a profile for a single friend of mine so we can see if the females are any better at the photo thing.

I'll update you soon.

Until next time,

Have fun.

Tasha

Cashless journey - the summary

That was a fun experiment!

I survived very easily until the very last day. I went to Melrose Arch to the iFix store and met a friend for pink drinks. We were talking about the project and he said the only cash he ever uses is at parking machines at shopping centers. We both agreed that Meltose Arch would have modern enough machines to accept cards and I would not have a problem. Bruce, we were mistaken, no cards at the parking, and I had to give in and haul out the cash. Almost made it. 

Vaughn on the other hand had problems almost every day. Here is his update:

Ok, this hasn’t been easy!

Wednesday: No cash required, the canteen that serves food, only accepts cash and no cards-my stomach was growling J

Thursday: No cash required, my wife however had to put R80 into an envelope for my child’s event at school-I hope that is ok? It didn’t come out of my pocket though.

Friday: We went through to Kievits Kroon and there I paid R9.50 at the toll gates

Saturday: No cash required

Sunday: R9.50 at the toll gate going back home

Funny how, when you know you can’t use something-the world makes it obvious that you need it for that time period!!

Well tried Vaughn!

I really think that cash is on its way out.

I'll be thinking up a new experiment soon. 

Until then, have fun.

Cashless journey day 4

Well, so far so good, it's been a really easy journey. I have cash on me, for just in case, but I have not had to use it yet. I needed some nails to put up pictures in my scrapping room today and couldn't find the right ones; I drove to the corner hardware store and after the chap working there had painstakingly handwritten up each item I bought, he took a deep breath and asked if I had cash on me, as their card machine was in for repairs. Sorry dude, no sale. I left and drove a further 500m to a building store where I could get the nails and pay by card. Let's hope the next few days are as simple.

Cashless journey Day 1

Last week I had a coffee meeting with a vendor that I had not met before. We met at a coffee shop, the conversation flowed and it was an easy comfortable meeting. The discussion turned to the demise of the ATM and how little we make use of cash. I said I could easily go a week without using any cash and he said he would love to be part of the experiment. The only rules we would have would be; no cash for 7 days and if we did need to deviate, we would document the fact. I agreed to blog about the experiment.

Day 1 

So far so good, went out for lunch, no cash required, out to dinner and I was concerned that I would need cash for the parking machine but the place we went to had free parking.

The day of the tattoos

It was the 13th February 2013; Richard's birthday and 14 years since he was last with us. We had decided that we were all going to have tattoos that incorporated our family symbol in some way . 8x was always special to Richard and I, and became a family code of acknowledging how much love we felt for each other and our little clan. The 8 and x lent itself beautifully to another symbol that I loved - the infinity sign, so that was what I had done on the back of my neck. 

We went off to the tattoo place, which was at a home in Edenvale that had been recommended to us by Caroline - a precious family friend. I was pleased to see how clean and professional the whole setup was the and was most grateful that I went first. I think I would have chickened out if I didn't. We discussed the position of the tattoo, the size of it and the colour that I wanted incorporated into the symbol. Off I went and had no idea what to expect. 

My prior experience with tattoos was only watching Tarryn and Luke getting theirs done in Thailand in 2010. I'm surprised I ever agreed to have it done after watching Luke's performance! It was a bit painful, but I got through it fine and was very pleased with the result, even though I have never been able too see it, excepting for photos and using mirrors. I often forget that I have a tattoo.

Kiara got a beautiful feather outlined in white ink with 2 beads hanging off it that had the 8 and x in them. Devin got his dad's name and the infinity sign underneath it and Tarryn had 8x on the inside of her middle finger. She also had the go-ordinates of our house above her hip and a beautiful saying that is special to her and her cousin Anthea on her foot.

I loved this ceremony of honoring Richard and having a visual display of our shared family bond.

Our heritage

This months interest of mine is our heritage. I found an app to do a family tree, and so far I have added 105 of our closest relatives. I'm hooked but am hampered by the fact that I don't want to pay money to trace ancestors at this stage. I'm not sure which sites I can trust, so need to do more digging on my own. The most interesting site I have found so far is one that has a project to photograph and document grave sites. I found photos of my dad's grave, all 4 of my grandparents and my great grandfather too. Although the cemetery is not too far from where I live, it's not safe to visit it, I really appreciate their efforts. I remember as a little girl, we would go the the flower shop over the road from the Primrose cemetery in Germiston, every Sunday morning. The shop had wide red polished steps, I think they were curved leading up to the display of tin buckets that held all the flowers. I can still recall the smell in that shop with its red polished floor. I learnt what Glads were (gladioli) and carnations and baby's breath. We would all go as a family with my Oumie (Gran) and my parents, brother, Dolores my aunt, sometimes my uncle George too. Once, my uncle George was screamed at by a person visiting because he sat on the gravestone 😀. He was never too fussed about protocol. There were always 2 old ladies visiting the grave near to my Dida's grave, they would be there in an old VW beetle car. I think they brought their lunch with them. They wore black from top to toe, even covering their heads, maybe that's the reason I still wear black to work every day. From the day I went back after Richrds death, I have never worn any colour to work. I think the word is a mantilla for the head coverings they wore; strange how you remember stuff so clearly from your youth. My Oumie died in 1971 so these memories were from before that.

One of my new 101 goals

So I love having goals, but even more than that I love accomplishing them them. I will be posting regularly again in this space. It's only for a select few, so it's not like any of the other social media that I use.  My new list will be published soon but, I want to tell you about this one goal so long, and an app that I found. The app is called Memrise and it's helping me to learn more of another language. I have tried listening to cd's for languages, as well as other apps but nothing comes close to this one. It's simple to use, clean design and visible progress makes it perfect for me. 

This time I chose Spanish to test out and after 2 days, I'm confident that I can read, say and write the 21 new words that I have learnt and reviewed a few times. I was caught out the first time I used the app, I listened to the words and recognized them but one option they request is, they say the word and you have to type it out! After that I focused on how to spell the words too.

This is what the icon looks like. I downloaded it from the iStore as a free app.

More later xx