If outdoor adventures are your thing, then like me, you probably enjoy visiting outdoor equipment stores. It’s not just the cool stuff in there, it’s also the people who demonstrate and sell it. I recently witnessed a sales presentation of a non-lethal self defence weapon that can incapacitate attackers with chemical irritants delivered by high velocity projectiles. The salesperson was enthralling and I found myself hoping for a demonstration. That never happened, and it’s probably just as well.

Our son has been introduced to the world of physiotherapy. He knows a few new things now (apart from rethinking the height that it’s safe to jump down from). Here are some of them, perhaps you’ve learned them too? People who become physios or biokineticists often share certain definitive characteristics. They’re often small in stature, warm and personable in their manner, freakishly strong and fascinated by pain. They are genuinely kind and passionate about helping people and they seem to be able to use pain to do so.

Perhaps you’ve seen this kind of thing go down, or been part of it, it happens in restaurants all over the world. Everything is fine until the bill arrives. “I’ll get this one”. “No, please let me get it!”. What follows would be really funny, if it wasn’t so awkward. A long drawn out conflict filled with negotiations and compromises eventually ends with someone having the satisfaction of winning the honour of paying. An honour that, curiously, nobody really wanted in the first place.

You’ve probably heard it said that the more we learn, the less we know. Ironically, nobody seems to know who said that first, but they had a point. 2020 certainly taught us how much we didn’t know. Audio processing for live streaming was a huge challenge for me. Previously unknown concepts like audio filters, range limiters and noise gates needed to be understood and applied to ever changing situations. I remember the frustration of realising how little I knew and the admiration I had for those who seemed to understand it all. 

Access control is everywhere and it’s getting more complicated. We wish it wasn’t necessary but we’re probably all grateful for it’s protection, even as we’re constantly striving to make it more efficient and effective. It’s nothing new either. Walls and gates have been around for as long as humans have been plagued by the desire to take stuff that doesn’t belong to us – longer actually. In 2003, Peter Agre was awarded the Nobel prize for identifying and describing gates that have always existed in biological cell walls. 

I was thrilled to discover the origin of a widely used saying recently. It’s great having something like this explained, but even better seeing it demonstrated, especially by a great friend who shares a passion for exciting and slightly dangerous exploits. We’ve shared a number of these, and so when he called to invite me to witness an experiment of sorts (one with much historical and scientific value you understand) I could hardly wait.

Being away on holiday at this time of year is fantastic, being home in Joburg while everybody else is on holiday has it’s merits too. The city of gold seems to slow down a fraction, calm a little, the traffic eases up and we all tend to be a little more chilled. Unless of course we’re last-minute Christmas shopping, scrambling to get the lunch ready for the extended family, or rushing around from one function to the next.

Counting juvenile fish is harder than you think. They’re small, constantly on the move, and have no real distinguishing features to identify individuals. Our family took turns over a number of days to try to establish how many African Cichlid fry had survived the three week brooding period in the mouth of their mother Bethany. It didn’t look like Bethany was counting though, she was too busy eating. After weeks of no food, and only the taste of baby fish in her mouth, who could blame her?

I know someone who doesn’t like chocolate. Just one person. Asking almost any other human being if they like chocolate is silly, it’s better to ask which sort they prefer. It may be the sweeter kind with chewy textures and contrasting flavours, or perhaps the pure, dark stuff with it’s complex bitter sweet balance. 

Some 700m underwater, in oceans all over the globe there’s a strange fish hovering almost motionless, searching the waters for unsuspecting victims. They’ve been doing this since forever without most of us having the slightest clue of their existence. Then in 2004 someone managed to photograph the “Barreleye”, and it’s been freaking us out ever since.

Imagine a creature so astonishing that the first British scientists to study it from written reports, and preserved remains thought they were being pranked. One of them, George Shaw, reportedly hacked a preserved specimen apart with scissors to search for the taxidermist’s stitches. His training and experience convinced him that someone must have stitched a bunch of different animal parts together. If only he knew the whole of it.

Nothing lasts forever, especially modern technology. Have you noticed though, how often technology fails when there are other, more serious issues to deal with? Financial stress, health concerns and everything in between, all tend to get that little bit more difficult when some or other stupid device breaks down. Perhaps you know the feeling?

Were you well behaved at school, or did you push the boundaries? Can you remember getting caught and properly punished? I do. Vividly. I don’t remember what I did wrong, but I was in grade eight and new in school. My older sister had been there a while, and was in grade 12. Her class happened to be lined up and waiting for the teacher to whom I had been sent for corrective attention, no fun for a grade eight still drowning in an oversized uniform.

Why did a bunch of people go to such lengths to save one insignificant little bunny - from those who found her, fed her, donated money and got her to the vet, to the vet who treated her free-of-charge and adopted her. Why does Manna’s story so warm and encourage us? Perhaps we love a rescue. Perhaps somewhere deep down it resonates with our soul.

Even if marine biology doesn’t float your boat, keep reading, because there’s much to learn from the incredible Argonaut. It was long believed that they appropriated their spiral shell from some unfortunate creature in order to float away on it - raising up their tentacles to catch the wind. This was the widely accepted theory from Aristotle to just a few years back, even though it was never actually observed. Bizarre isn’t it? It’s not the only thing we’ve got wrong either.

It’s difficult to see anything special about Mallee fowl, the rather drab looking, chicken-sized Australian birds. Their singing doesn’t exactly turn heads either but the way that they nest and raise their young, is spectacular. Mallee fowl mate for life, and go about raising their families in a most surprising way.