Example of Irony

We received this notice from TripAdvisor showing BudaBaB as one of the top bed and breakfasts in Budapest.









This happened right around the same time as this started appearing on Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Internet Explorer in various mutations. It seems that the alternate site that was used for our booking engine went belly up suddenly and unexpectedly. As they were doing the out of business thing, they left malware hacks in all of the sites they were affiliated with. This has been a nightmare trying to correct. In the meanwhile, no one can get onto the site to check us out nor can they make a booking. The potential loss of income is questionable.

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Symbaloo

Every so often in my computerized journeys, I come across some little tool that I try out and find really helpful. I like sharing it with others. This last week, I came across Symbaloo, a visual bookmarking system for Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, and I think Safari too. I have used a variety of these types o programs in the past, but what generally happened was they were computer dependent. I would get one all set up on one computer, but then have to recreate the entire thing on other computers. The other negative issue was that each time Firefox updated, it rendered the program inoperable until they upgraded for the compatibility.


With Symbaloo, it is created in the cloud. I only had to create it once to make it available on all computers and in all browsers. Better yet, I could create my personal set of links; I have travel one, another for school, and so on. One click and I can move from one set to the next. This saves me from hunting through my bookmarks and I no longer have a bunch of bookmarks across the top of my screen taking up valuable screen space. Here are shots of two of my Symbaloo tiles. There are many for teachers already created by other teachers, which is great since you can share your webmix with others.

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• Using Symbaloo to Organize Your Lessons (med523summer11.wordpress.com)

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An Apple a Day Does Not Keep the Virus Away

We know someone who is obsessed with Apple computers. Actually, obsessed is too lenient a word for him. It really borders on the psychotic. The few times we are around him, we have had a sparring match over Apple vs PC. This is not referring to Ray, as we have never met.

Both sides seem to have their loyalists who swear they will never change. Even my reader/e-mail buddy Ray, in New Orleans suggested I start collecting Apples instead lemons. Those were my twisted words, not his, but the tone was subliminally projecting from his e-mail. Ray put forth that Apple was becoming so much more popular in the States. That made me curious, but today one of the computer newsletters I subscribe to had this in today's e-mail with this piece of a larger story on computer viruses.   

Windows Secrets Newsletter • Issue 238 • 2010-04-01 • Circulation: over 400,000. 

Okay, you may not be convinced saying it is Windows sabotage, but let me assure you the rest  of the article was not offering too much praise for Fire Fox or Internet Explorer, but Google Chrome came out of the scuffle well. 

"Safari may be the most-vulnerable browser"
The first browser to fall in the CanSecWest competition was Safari, mostly due to Charlie Miller's expertise in Apple code. There's been a long and loud debate about why hacking is such a problem on Windows yet relatively unheard of on the Mac.

Given the huge commercial nature of today's malware attacks, the answer is not that Macs are more secure (they're not, according to almost every security expert) or that hackers have it out for that evil empire called Microsoft. The answer most likely comes down to money. Mac's approximately 8% market share simply does not offer sufficient monetary return on a hacker's time investment. Mac users are just plain lucky.

For an interesting and somewhat worrisome article on Mac malware, read Andy Greenberg's March 25 article, "The bounty for an Apple bug: $115,000." This computer security person found 20 ways to hack an Apple, better than some pastry chefs can do.

This of course, made me more curious, so I had to check out market share of Apple. Here are core parts that stem from the Internet coverage.

Apple drops to 5th in US computer sales

Apple has sunk a full position in the US computer market during the spring, according to early estimates by IDC. The Mac producer is expected to have dropped from fourth place in the winter to fifth in the spring as it should have shipped 12.4 percent fewer computers than it did a year earlier, falling to 1.21 million Macs. Its market share is poised to remain the same at 7.6 percent but will have been eclipsed by Toshiba, which could jump over a full percentage point to ship 7.7 percent of PCs in the US.

Of the top five, the only other firm to lose market share is predicted to be Dell. If accurate, Dell would still have the lead with 26.3 percent of the market but will have shipped 18.9 percent fewer PCs than it did in spring 2008 and would have shipped just 40,000 more computers than HP at 4.17 million. HP's deliveries are still anticipated as being near flat at 2.3 percent growth from year to year, though the lack of change was enough for Dell to at least temporarily regain a lead it had lost in winter of this year.

Acer will have grown the quickest under these estimates, jumping exactly 51 percent to reach nearly 2.01 million PCs shipped and 12.6 percent of the American market.

And then there is this...

"Move over Microsoft. Apple can claim big, big market share numbers, too. According to NPD, in June, nine out of 10 dollars spent on computers costing $1,000 or more went to Apple. Mac revenue market share in the "premium" price segment was 91 percent, up from 88 percent in May."

So with the cost of PCs dropping steadily, but performance improving, does this mean that Apples are just status symbols for the upwardly mobile? Personally, I have never liked the looks of a Mac or Apple screen and could not see spending time working looking at them. The other thing that always turned me off was downloading or buying some great new software, but noticing the label or note "Sorry, we have not bothered to make a version for any Apple product yet, losers."  Now that is just wrong. What I can live with is seeing Fire Fox v.3.6.2a for PC and Fire Fox v.000062 beta for MAC. Now that I know there is only 8% market share, it makes sense no one wants to write code for them. ;  )

The second article down is interesting too, discussing how the IPad may chop down the Apple tree.

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High Five the Big Five

What is it with these places, skimping on insulation. We could clearly hear the couple next door so clearly at one point, I jumped up in bed, thinking they were at the foot of it. The original plan for the day was to do an early 2 hour drive, return to the hotel, go out again in the afternoon, and then call it a day. Joseph suggested we order picnic lunches go out at 7:30am instead of 6:30am and spend the day out, returning at  3;30pm. The rationale was that we could go deeper in the reserve if we had more time out, so we went along with the plan.

Drive, zebras, zebras, wildebeests, zebras, drive, drive, drive, elephants, antelope, elands, gazelles, Giselles, drive, drive, tupelos, dik-diks, but no spotted dick, zebras, mongooses or is it mongeese, drive, drive, drive, drive, drive, elephants, zebras, cheetahs, water buffaloes, lions. A group of three lions were parading across the plain as calmly as you please. Then we came upon a pride with 2 males and 3 females just lazying about on  a mound just twenty feet away from  our van. Like a rehearsed performance, they took time to stand strut, pose, and then back down to rest yet again.

We stopped for our picnic lunch at a picnic area that was swarming with monkeys. As cute at they were, we had to protect our lunches. Joseph had set our boxes on a stone table, no seating available, which was fine. We had been sitting for hours already. Under the shade of a tree, we opened our boxes to reveal what edibles we had. Faster than an Italian purse snatcher, a monkey that we had not noticed, dropped down from the tree's branch onto our makeshift table, grabbed one of my plastic wrapped sandwiches and was back in the tree stripping it to eat. No one has taught them not to litter. He flung the plastic onto the ground before savoring his newly stolen treat. He did not even have the decency to leave the area. He sat there eating within my line of vision with what I would swear was a smile on his face. I offered my boiled egg as a peace offering to those who tried sharing the sandwich with the furry thief, but was told not to feed the animals. As if... They seem to work in teams with others; one acts cute and does antics, so another can be slipping your food away while you are distracted.

It was getting close to 2:30 and we were to return at 3:30. Joseph went off the beaten path again to return to the tree where we saw the leopard's litter in the tree, but again no one was home. As we were driving back, all of a sudden he pulled off of the pathway again and when zooning through hill and dale, bushes and small trees to come to a small cliff where he stopped, pointed at a tree while announcing "leopard". We spotted our first leopard in the wild ever. This had now completed our Big 5 sightings.

At 7pm, there is the bushbaby feeding. No one could explain to us what a bushbaby was, so  we waited to see for ourselves. This creature has been conditioned to come for food at 7pm each night, but tonight his watch must have been off. We waited until 7:30, but he/she/it was a no-show. Just as we were going in to dinner, we did see this fat dark brown squirrel looking creature running around the rim of the inner walls of the bar. Someone said that was the bushbaby.

Dinner was a bit different tonight. They set up barbeques out by the poolside. They also had woman dressed in traditional clothing cooking on mats on the ground. Some were frying sweet dough and others were frying savory dough or creating a lentil dish. Inside was the buffet in addition, but the entrees were all outdoors. One dish that was different was mashed potatoes combined with mashed vegetables, making for green mashed mounds. As green as it was, the potato flavor was dominant. Many of the traditional African foods that I have sampled so far are rather bland, lacking spices.

We had left our laundry to be done yesterday. Right after dinner, I went to the desk to ask the cost and pay cash. The young man at the desk asked my room number, shuffled through a pile of papers and then said 1,250 shillings. However, he stumbled over the numbers, which made me realize yet again that though English is an official language, many have difficulty with it. I gave him the exact amount, he marked the slip  and said okay, but without giving me a receipt. When we returned to the room, the bag of laundry was on our bed with the bill for 1,050 shillings, 200 less than I was told. That had me worried that I may have paid someone else's bill by accident. Since the man had difficulty telling me the numbers for the cost, I had to wonder if he understood the numbers when I told him the room number. I really don't want to pay another 12 euros for the laundry yet again, but I am hesitant to embarrass him by asking someone else for assistance tomorrow. Even with the accent difference, we have had to repeat things and change the words we use, but have had times where we still were not understood. 

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On a Safari We Will Go

I thought Joseph said we should have breakfast at 6am and be ready to go by 6:30. Ron heard 7am and 7:30. Allowing him to be the fall-guy if we were were wrong, we slept in until 5:45am. Big whoop! Our day was going to include 8 hours of driving around the reserve, hunting for animals to shoot with our cameras. With that in mind, I thought it best to skip out on breakfast. It is not like you can pop out of the van just anywhere if a bathroom need arises.

I forgot to mention that our van has a pop top roof, so we can comfortably stand up in it and view animals without the hindrance of a window. From what we have seen, this is the most common, though we did notice two vans with window viewing only. Initially, knowing we would return to camp around 3:30 seemed like a waste of the rest of the day. What rocked me back to reality and to sleepyland were the roads once again. As comfortable as the van seats are, 8 hours of shaken, not stirred is quite enough. It is like being in a children's bouncy house on steroids without any control over the motion. I would have fallen asleep, but was too paranoid about missing some fleeting animal while trying to adjust my eyes.

The animals were much more gracious with their time today. Within our first hour, we came across a single bull elephant just wandering across the road. He looked like he has seen better days. Joseph guessed he was quite old and ready to retire permanently. Shortly after the elephant was out of viewing range, we encountered some hyenas along the side of the road, posing for our camera. Not long after, we spotted two more hyenas feasting on a dead elephant. This was a bit unnerving after seeing the old bull elephant. As much as this is the cycle of the natural order, we were not witness to this much in past safaris.

Keeping it brief since I taxed my reader's patience with yesterday's post and numbed my fingers in the process, I will keep this to a minimum. What is difficult to grasp in how completely the scenery changes within the reserve. In one area, it may be littered with scrub brush and umbrella trees, while a few miles later, it is completely empty savannah wasteland. After making a turn on another dirt road, you may find a swamp filled with enough water to almost submerge a baby elephant. We drove for hours over a vacant dusty area with no vegetation in sight for miles. Joseph said that during the rainy season, this was a lake with so much water; a 4WD vehicle could not cross it. You could just about fit Rhode Island along with a touch of Delaware into what would be the lake. For the amount of time we drove, we could have been 1/2 way across the State of Pennsylvania.

For lunch, the camp packed us box lunches since we would miss out having it at the camp. We stopped at a look-out hill, where we had to climb over a hundred steps to reach the top. Not being normal steps, they were the kind that required two paces before reaching the next step to elevate you up the hill. Not being the energetic outdoorsy type, I had an inward groan loud enough to shake up the organs not yet in turmoil from the van ride. I did it; it was worth the effort, though besides carrying my body, I had our lunches. The bag must have weighed ten pounds.

The view was incredible, including another swamp area where two hippos were bathing, grazing, and then bathing once again. We were joined by magnificent birds with electric blue wings, but yellow and orange underbellies who wanted to share our lunch. This was certainly possible. They packed a box for each of us that could have supplied a small tribe. In addition to a sandwich, there was fried chicken, papaya cut and ready to eat, watermelon, a local fruit we have yet to identify, cookies, a fruit juice box, candy bar, a hardboiled egg, and more.

A number of guinea hens came to greet us knowing food was on offer. Between the hens and the blue birds we were able to make some new friends as long as our sharing held out. Although the wind was horrendous, we managed to stay up there for about forty-five minutes enjoying the splendor. Returning to the van, we had a two hour safari drive before heading back to camp. This made me realize yet again that a safari has such romantic connotations, but it really depends on luck. This is not Disney World where the animals are lined up ready for viewing doing cute things. They are doing what they are naturally inclined to do and if you happen to be at the right place at the right time, you will be lucky enough to witness it. Sometimes, you can go for hours without seeing a thing at all. Honestly, by 3:30, I was more than ready to return to the camp. We were worn out; I cannot fathom how Joseph does this repeatedly.

We dropped our things off at the tent and headed to the pool. As lovely as it is, it was not being utilized at all allowing to take charge and do what we wanted. Although the water was chilly at first, it felt good after a few minutes. Allowing enough time for our suits to dry, we went for a beer, before getting dinner. At 9pm each night, the staff has a show of local dance. Strangely, in the dark of night, they build a campfire, but most of them dress in black, causing them to barely be visible.

Tomorrow is a 6:30 departure with another long day.

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Etosha National Park Game Drive

We had to wake at 5:00 this morning to be at the truck by 5:45. We are going on a safari drive and I guess the animals are early risers, so we have to catch them before the sun and heat make them as lethargic as it does us. We are only having coffee and tea and then breakfast will be after our drive. Bruce wants to be at the gate of the park when it opens at 6:30.

The drive was good, but this truck is not suitable for safari drives. Last year, we drove in an open vehicle and it was so much better for viewing. When you have 20 people in a closed truck, it is impossible for everyone to get the photos they want and the animals are not going to stand around and pose waiting for us to finish taking pictures.

We were in awe at the number of zebras, giraffes, and impalas we saw, but no lions, leopards or elephants. After returning to the camp, we checked out of our rooms. We are spending another night in the park, but on the other side. We drove around the park for three hours then went to a rest stop for lunch. We had three hours break here and a swimming pool for those that wanted to cool off. We no longer had a towel, so there was no sense in dragging out our suitcases for the suits, though Ron did and air dried. I sat under a tree and read, but it was SO hot, it knocked me out and I fell asleep on the bench by the pool. I hate that feeling of waking up more groggy than if you had not slept at all, but that is how I was feeling. I cannot keep my eyes open today and it is so hot and humid, making it even worse. I feel like I have been drugged. Hmmm….have I said anything to upset Bruce enough to have drugged my food? No, I don’t think so.

There seems to be a definite energy difference on the truck. Ron heard others comment about it too, so it is not just me. I am not certain if it is the time on the truck or the absence of the kids that is doing it. Perhaps it is just the heat. Everyone seems to be sleeping more. I keep taking naps, though I really want to see the animals. Each time I sensed the truck stop, I woke with a fright, feeling excitement building. After last year, in Krueger, I really hate this truck for the safari drives. There are not enough open windows for everyone to get shots. I am also getting cramped in these seats. It seems the legroom is shrinking each day. Ron moved back with Thomas one row back so I could stretch my leg. Poor Thomas has to give up his space, but he seems to like Ron.

Tomorrow when we reach Windhoek, we will say good-bye to Dirk and Harm. I am going to miss their quiet energy and soft humor.

When we returned to the camp du jour, we went to reception for keys, then a shop stop. Another forty-five minute drive followed adding to the list of hundreds of zebras, giraffes, and springboks, we have seen. Perhaps they are all the same ones over and over again and they are really placed on a giant rotating plate to pass by us every forty-five minutes. My anger over this truck for animal viewing is building each hour.

Finally, I scored us a chalet closer to where the truck is parked with only a short distance to walk. Up until now, we have had the places the farthest from the truck and had to lug our luggage, while the young strong bucks are close by.

Again, we are sharing a chalet with Omo and Jean who we get along with stupendously. Dinner is at 8:00 pm around the campfire with nice camaraderie. Those who went to the watering hole on this side of the park said it was not as good as the other side, so we did not bother. No one has seen any animals there, only birds.

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