Penile Plethysmograph, the Penis Polygraph or Dick Lie Detector

Oh, I do not know whether it is a good thing or not that you cannot pick up one of these from Dischem or not. A Penile Plethysmograph is a device which measures changes in blood flow in the penis. There are two types. One is like a blood pressure monitor which involves an inflatable cuff and mercury and the other an airtight tube which is inserted over the penis and measures the displacement of air. Basically it boils down to being a hard-on detector. Why on earth would you want that? Well it is for one used to detect sexual arousal at the presentation of certain stimuli. It was developed in the 50’s in the former Czechoslovakia when they threw you in prison if you were gay. So if any doubt existed, they connected the guy in question’s member to this contraption, showed him homosexual pornography and if he dared to wood, he got thrown into jail. Today it is still used in many countries with paedophiles, though there is a lot of controversy over the validity of the test results, and is often not regarded as admissible evidence in court. It is also used to measure progress after certain types of surgery to correct erectile dysfunction. I knew a couple once, the girl was a bit of a control freak. When they used to watch movies (Mainstream NOT porn) and if there happened to be a love scene in the movie, the girl would feel between the guy’s legs, and woe betide him should there even be the slightest stirring. I think she would have loved to have a penile plethysmograph. When I stumbled upon this on the Net, I had such a good laugh. It is one of those topics which can make your imagination run wild...

ADD & irritation

Yesterday I was stuck in traffic for 3 hours on my to work. My levels of frustration hit maximum, and I was NEVER able to calm down again for the rest of the day. I left very early this morning, but I have still not recovered completely. It feels as if all my synapses are going bzzt bzzt bzzt bzzzzzzzz zt zt zt bzzzz. On days like yesterday not even Ritalin helps.

Hardspear now on twitter

I, J. Hardspear de la Azotea finally started twittering. I have had an account for ages, never used it though.

There are no Trekkies in Joburg...

Everytime someone gives me a gap in traffic, I boldly salute them with the Mr. Spock live-long-and-prosper Vulcan salute. This salute has been adopted by Trekkies (StarTrek freakazoid super fan nerds) all over the world. I also give the salute when I give someone else a gap by acknowledging their wave/flicker of thanks.

No one ever gave me the salute back yet. Once a guy smiled wryly. Come on Jozi – as you travel at WARP speed 0,000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001, cursing SANRAL and the nerd with the thick black framed glasses needs a gap, give way, return his salute, have a chuckle for even serious, calculating super-rational Vulcans from space are supporting Lead SA.

Cell C & Trevor Noah a month down the line!

Cell C & Trevor Noah received a lot of bad publicity because of their recent ad-campaign. I know I am a month late with my 2cents worth, but I have been wanting to do a post about this, but I just did not get round to it. Also, I think it is a good time to reflect now. The ad campaign started with an anonymous user posting a clip of Trevor Noah on YouTube ranting about cellular service in South Africa. People started watching... Cell C then ‘discovered’ the clip and publicly responded to it. Soon after the ‘real’ ad-campaign begin. By this time everyone was listening. Now, many of the people who complained are extolled as being ‘Marketing Guru’s’. Quite a number of bloggers slammed the ad campaign as well. Some of the comments were that Cell C has damaged their own reputation with this. What I, J. Hardspear de la Azotea want to know, a month down the line after the initial hue and cry... Are those who initially condemned the manner in which Cell C & Trevor Noah used their respective positions to create a bogus situation, still of opinion that it was bad scheming? Can this stroke even be seen as unscrupulous? I think not. I think it was just the right mix of Viral Marketing combined with Astroturfing as well as focussed television, radio & print advertising. I think it is exceptional. The way in which social networking has redefined the way in which we communicate calls for new ways of marketing. It also lends itself wholly to methods such as Viral Marketing. Viral Marketing through social networks is just so much more effective than physical word-to-mouth. Everybody is doing it. Ola just did it with their new Magnum ad campaign. The advertisements are still to be launched, but they started the campaign with a video on YouTube, called Truck Jacking in Jozi. They only recently claimed responsibility for the video. Astroturfing is an entirely different matter altogether. AstroTurf is a brand of artificial lawn, the brand name widely applied to all different brands of fake grass. (After this winter I think I should replace my lawn with AstroTurf. I always have images of lurid green grass mats surrounding an open grave & grieving people in a dusty, dull brown cemetery). Sorry... I am digressing. In order to do the ‘we-are-addressing-the-concerns-of-the-people-at-grass-root-level’ routine politicians and their spin doctors develop ploys to make it look as if their agendas actually spring forth from the needs & wants of the constituents. This nifty trick has been adopted by marketing- and advertising agencies in order to lend authenticity to what they peddle. In the English speaking countries of the world we are all tend to admire the way upper-class Brits verbalize and articulate themselves. Not to talk about the accent. It is awe-inspiring & intimidating at the same time. Yet...you gotta appreciate the easy way in which the Americans go about with the English Language. Prime example above... calling the artificial engineering of messages into looking as if coming from grass-root level – Astroturfing! So after all the sneaky viral marketing with the Trevor Noah clip on YouTube and astroturfing of ‘responding’ to Trevor Noah in the media, Cell C finally launched stage 3 – a very visible media advertising campaign. Beautifully designed billboard posters, funny radio ads and sleek tv commercials. Just appreciate the colour scheme. Who would have thought shades of brown can look crisp, clear, corporate and yet friendly? I am sure that I fall in a number of the cellular networks in SA’s product markets. I have a cellphone device, which I get with my voice contract. Then the voice contract itself. Furthermore the wireless 3G data device and the data contract. I use all of these products for both business & private needs. Heaven knows what LSM they would put me in. From my perspective though, the current Cell C media adverts appeal to me as user of all of the above products. I am with Vodacom and like most cellular users in SA I am: · Fed up with the high cellphone bills. (I really try to watch my usage) · Fed up with the high internet connectivity cost. (As consultant I move around too much to use fixed line internet) · Fed up with poor reception, dropped calls etc. · Fed up with poor & slow internet connectivity. (oh, by the way, what happened to the bigg-ass high speed under-the-sea cable which would have dragged Africa into a (cheaper) internet age?) I have not yet moved to another cellular service provider because I am not convinced that MTN or Cell C can provide me with any better service than Vodacom does. Everyone I know have the same complaints, irrespective of their provider. Sooooo.... Inspired by the ad campaign, I decided to take up Trevor Noah and drop him a message. As I was typing the message on the Cell C site, telling him that if he can address my issues, I will move to Cell C, I lost internet connection. I did not bother to go back. Easily influenced as I am, I heard Vodacom’s ad on the radio, offering 1GIG Data for R289 per month, including a new Broadband modem. I went and got mine straight away, forgetting all about Cell C, till the next time Trevor Noah glowered at me from a billboard next to the highway. I even got a GIG data free (between 12:00am and 05:00am). Yay! Like I am going to use it. Nobody even watches PORN at that time of night! And what time I had to get the new modem working!! In the end I had to take it in to a Vodacom Customer Care Walk in Centre. Please remember the poken competition – see post below. Closing Date is the 30th of September 2010. You need to be situated in SA to apply.

Poken - electronic mini cyber sex to replace business cards

I attended the MARKEX trade show at Sandton Convention Centre last week. I was already overly stimulated and oozing electronic gadgetry lust from everything on display, as well as heady from the effects of the oxygen bar where I just OD’d on lime scented O2, when I stumbled upon something which nearly made me jizz in my pants. A number of people were gathered around an interesting looking stall...

A lady attendant seemed to be free and I her asked what they had to offer. She then produced a little plastic figurine-like thingy with a strong Japanese Pop-Art feel to it. She called it a POKEN and started to tell me all about it:

A poken is a little key-chain gadget which at its most basic is an electronic business card exchange device. It utilizes a proprietary Near Field Communication (NFC) technology to allow the exchange of information one would usually put on a printed business card. All you need to is to hold your poken next to someone else’s and press a button and voila – your poken has electronic sex in cyberspace with the other person’s poken and your details have been exchanged. Once you plug in your poken in a USB slot of your computer, it links you with your personal profile on the poken website and all the people you have pokened are now linked to your profile.

Yet, the poken is more of a social business card than what the traditional type is. One can link all your social network information to your poken profile, which is exchanged together with your other info when you poken somebody. The same rules of inviting and accepting still apply, but it saves you having to sift through 1 000’s of John Smiths’ LinkedIn, Skype or Facebook profiles till you find the right one.

I had to have one and purchased one on the spot. I googled poken and found that other bloggers I know (such as sheebee whom I have met in real life as well) already know about pokens and have blogged about it. I love this thingy so much and would love to promote it. So, for the first time I, J. Hardspear de la Azotea, will be having a competition on my blog. 5 readers can win a poken each. To enter, please mention this post on your blog, with a link-back to this post. Also send me a mail to hardspear@hotmail.com with a link to your post and a one-liner as to why you should win a poken.

Mac & Cheese for many on a Crazy Sunday Evening

Our weekend started...erm... not good. I got up in the worst of moods on Saturday morning, which made it not a good idea to go to the shops. In Pick ‘n Pay Lamb loaded Image (1year & 9months old) into one of those small basket trolleys. I thought that this is not a good idea, but moodily said nothing. Going out of P’n P (They are busy with construction) the top-heavy trolley’s front wheels caught and toppled right over. Lamb was pushing and despite her attempt to keep the trolley upright, it toppled forward. Image fell out of the trolley and Lamb also fell face down. No one got hurt, but all of us got a big fright. Image only grazed her face, which resulted in two ugly scabs – one above her brow and one on her cheek. In America I could have sued the store, despite our stupidity of putting the child in a basket trolley. For the rest of the day, Lamb and I were a bit irritated with each other. On the spur of the moment she decided to invite people for coffee on Sunday afternoon. She requested that I bake a chocolate cake, but instructed that it mustn’t be one of my fancy smancy laced with brandy and smothered with ganache gateaux cakes. She wants a ordinary (moist) chocolate cake with caramel condensed milk instead of icing. I then realised that I have never made an ordinary chocolate cake. I went through my books and got a good looking one from Heilie Piennaar’s ‘Too Fresh Too Flop’ baking book. I then decided, whilst we are going through all the trouble, I’ll make something for a light early evening supper. In the meanwhile we learned that friends of ours 1 year & 9 month old boy, Archangel Number One is in hospital. Lamb phoned and told them that they must come and drop 4 month old Archangel Number Two for the night. By the time the guests arrived, I have finished the cake, but not supper. I served very strong Turkish coffee infused with cardamom with the cake. Not everybody had the Turkish coffee though. I made it a bit strong, so I couldn’t really taste the cake, but Lamb assured me that it was nice. I then proceded made the following very delicious very cheesy Macaroni & Cheese for many. (with – many people milling about and many children running & screaming all over the place) Cook 2x 500g packets Macaroni as per instruction in a LARGE pot. Heat 1l full cream milk & 250 ml fresh cream to very warm but not boiling (one of the few instances where the microwave will do). Melt 150g butter in a medium sized pot (not marge), add 1tsp salt and 1tsp dry mustard powder and half a cup of flour. Mix well. Turn up heat add milk & cream and whisk well. Turn heat down. Add 200g grated mozzarella & 300g grated cheddar. Also add 1 grated onion and 6 extra large eggs beaten. Mix well. Cut 250g bacon in strips and sauté lightly. Combine drained macaroni, bacon & cheese sauce and put in a VERY large oven dish such as a roaster. Grate 150g extra mature cheddar cheese and 150g parmesan cheese. Mix with 150 g dry breadcrumbs and sprinkle over macaroni. Bake at 180˚C for 35-40 mins. Serve with a fresh garden salad and a strong vinaigrette to counter the richness of the mac & cheese. Nobody else wanted any alcohol, but I felt a bit freaked with all the caffeine in by body, the children running riot, Lamb and I being irritated, my new broadband 3G not working, so I polished a bottle of crisp Riesling by myself. By the time everyone left, my crocks stuck to the messy kitchen floor and I nearly slipped on a hill of salt which Image created in the passage. Then........ Lamb informed me, she cannot sleep next to a small baby, for she lies awake worrying if everything is OK. She’ll sleep in the spare room, and I have to share with little Archangel Number Two! I think I need another weekend!

Hardspear back at the gym and sick of EMINEM

I started gym again this week. This morning I attended an ‘express abs’ class. The instructor was this pretty little thing and I thought that she was really cute. By the end of the session I was of the opinion that she is actually the Witch of Endor in disguise. My abdominal muscles have become totally unresponsive since an hour after the class. What bothers me, is the fact that the same fat old Ooms who attended the gym when I left 2 years ago, are still there and they are still fat. What baffles me, is that they can outlast and outcycle all the young people in the spinning class, but they have not slimmed down at all in two years! Am I going to waste my time at the gym? I am sooo sick of EMINEM. I used to like his music, but he got so stuck on his horrible mom, dickhead (missing) dad, fucking Kim and poor, poor Haley. It is all he seems to sing about. Dude, you have the worst anger issues. Dude...Let it go... Please...