'Tis the Season

It's less than a week until Christmas - can you believe it? At the beginning of last week, my manager mentioned to me that support was all under control and I didn't need to come in to work on Monday and Tuesday next week if I didn't want to and would I like to take those two days off as well. After thinking about it for a while, checking what is coming up and what I need to prepare for next year, I decided that since I had some extra days of leave saved up, I thought I might as well take them and I'll just work extra hard to get as much as possible done before I head off on Friday (best Christmas present ever - 2 days of extra holiday!).

I always love this time of the year, it's probably my favourite holiday and so, I thought I'd share some of my favourite things about Christmas:

• Decorating the Christmas tree (with Christmas Carols as background music).
• Finishing off Christmas shopping and then spending an afternoon or two wrapping presents (while listening to Chrismas Carols).
• Time spent catching up with family and friends - since we live so far away from home, any family time is extra-precious.
• Swimming costumes and long summers days spent at the pool or beach.
• Ice creams, watermelon, G&Ts.
• Christmas carols - the old stuff, the new stuff and Carols by Candlelight.
• Delicious food (my folks make the best Christmas ham you'll ever eat!)
• Having a bit of time to just chill and think and reflect.

What are some of your favourite things about Christmas?

Lately August 2015

It's been such a crazy last few weeks that I've hardly had time to think about where my next meal is coming from, let alone plan more blog posts. But things are finally starting to wind down and it's just hit me that in less than 1 week (5 sleeps, to be exact) I am going to be heading off to Germany!

Ok, granted it's mainly for work, but still! I've managed to organise to spend the weekend before I start in Germany and I'm going to be meeting up with a friend who moved there recently and is going to come and spend some time exploring Cologne with me. And then, the weekend after I'm going to go and see where my friend lives in Regensburg. I've been doing a little bit of research into the places I'm going to be visiting and I'm really looking forward to it! In between the weekends I'm going to be training and then testing the software we've spent the better part of 6 months customising to suit our client. It's a tough life when you work on a project that sends you to cool places like Italy (see here) and Germany!

Since most of this month has been taken up with work, it feels like I haven't really done much, especially around the first half of the month. Although, that being said, we did manage to spend a wonderful afternoon at Spice Route the other weekend with some friends. And one Saturday I went to a morning Nikon Camera Course for my D3100 and Nathan Bezuidenhout taught us some awesome tips for using our cameras (after having it for a few years, there was still extra stuff that I could learn, which was great!) and then in the evening we went to a friends birthday party. And we made good use of our Table Mountain Cards and used them to catch a lift down after hiking to the top of the mountain one morning. And this last Sunday I went to a great market out near Darling on Groote Post Wine Farm with a friend. We may have come back with a boot full of wine and delicious toffee from Darling Sweet (think red wine and chocolate flavours, or honey and salt)...So scratch the idea of not managing to do all that much this month, considering we worked two weekends this month, we definitely made full use of the other two weekends! 

In the Nikon Camera training, we learnt how to take those cool pictures where the subject is in focus and the
background is blurred, this was the best one I got of my hand while I was playing around.

Me and Frosty at our friends awesome 80's themed birthday!

How incredible is this cake? I wish I could claim I made
it, but unfortunately I cant :(

Beautiful view from the front lawn of Spice Route.

We were so lucky with the weather on that day - probably one of the best day's we had in August!

I can't get enough of the Orange Breasted Sunbirds on top of Table
Mountain. This little guy was extremely interested when we started playing
his call using the Roberts App!

Looking regal on top of a red hot poker aloe

Life Lately

Hey everyone. I can't believe it's already more than half way through July and I've only posted 2 (ok, this counts as 3) blog posts. Life has been quite busy lately. I had an epic birthday a few weeks ago now and feel so incredibly blessed that I was able to share an awesome pre-birthday day with both family and friends together - something that doesn't happen often when you live and work far from where you grew up.

At work, we had a pretty intense testing phase of our project a few weeks back (known as FAT - Factory Acceptance Testing) which ran smoothly. There were a few bugs and a few smaller features that we identified as useful to the client, which is normal for these types of projects. But we didn't find anything hugely wrong while we were testing, which is really great news for us. After 6 months spent putting together specifications and another 6 months developing what we had specified, it would have been worrying if we had found major issues. So, so far so good on that front.

Otherwise, Frosty and I have been busy carrying on with two online courses*. The one is a basic programming course and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who is interested in learning how to program but unsure of where to start. It teaches you how to program using the Python programming language and has great videos and explanations on the basics of programming concepts. Remember the Photo Renaming Program I mentioned a while back? Well, I used Python to program it, and in some of my spare time I've added in some extra features. I'm hoping in the next few weeks to be able to share the improved Photo Renaming program with you, so watch this space! While I'm at it, if you have a better name for it than "Photo Renamer" please leave a comment below, I'd love a slightly more pretty name!

The other course we've been doing is really cool and I hope will be useful for future endeavours - it's an Android App programming course and this weekend our course project is due. We've had to create a simple app that changes squares of colours on the screen depending on the position of a slider. See in the two pictures above, how in the left image, the slider is on the left hand side and the right hand image, the slider has been slid all the way to the right hand side. I did that! And, those are screen shots from my actual phone. There's also a video that you can see, just click here. For most people, this probably wouldn't be that interesting or exciting, but I beg to differ! It's the start of actually being able to program an app, which is awesome! We've had to create apps from a blank canvas which has been a good way of consolidating the last few weeks worth of learning to make sure we actually understand what's going on in the course.

Keep an eye out for my second Quote of the Week which will be posted at some stage next week. It's a new feature that I'm starting to help keep me blogging more - so I hope you enjoy it! Here's the first one, for those who missed it. Don't forget you can follow me on Instagram as I will also be posting the quotes there.

* Which is probably part of the reason that I haven't had as much time to dedicate to blogging as usual recently.

Letter to My 16 Year Old Self

I recently read two blog posts where the authors wrote letters to their younger (21-year old) selves, you can read them here and here.

I've always loved this concept, either of writing to your past or your future self, and so I thought I would do the same. 21 feels like it's is a bit too close to be writing about, so instead I chose the age of 16*, which was probably one of my favourite years/ages at school and also quite a milestone age. I also thought that it's relevant to do this post in my birthday month, as it's been (almost) 10 years since I turned 16 and that's quite a milestone in itself!

* As I was writing this letter, it turned out to be pretty fun reminiscing about how much was still to come, so it's turned into a bit of a remembering session mixed with the odd piece of advice. Enjoy!

Dear just-turned-16-year-old-self, 

Remember when you sat at school and wondered what you would be doing 10 years from now, you tried to imagine the person you would be and the job you would be doing and who your friends would be and where you would be living and it seemed completely unfathomable to you? Well, you got there and it's pretty cool.

You're half way through Grade 10 and it turns out that your decision to choose a wide variety of subjects that would allow you to pick from a wide variety of careers after school was a good one. 

Art, English, Afrikaans and Biology Bilge turn out to be "supporter" subjects in your choice of career, but they're still useful. Especially English and Afrikaans orals. Those dreaded orals teach you incredibly valuable skills about speaking confidently in front of a group of people (you even come to enjoy talking in front of people, when it's a subject you are passionate about).

Science, Maths and Computer Science end up being the subjects that contribute the most to your current degree and career choice. Especially Computer Science. You don't end up studying forensic science (although you end up with a friend who studied it). You don't end up studying architecture, which is what you eventually decide on as your first choice of study (but you have a few friends who studied it). You do end up starting off studying computer and electrical engineering, your second choice of study. You think maybe you'll try to re-apply to architecture at university, but you don't. Ditch the hope now, put engineering as your first choice and rather get into res. You'll always be sad you never got to experience the res life at university. You do end up having some amazing times in digs though, in first and second year all your res friends would come and visit to get a taste of home life and you and your flatties would visit all your res friends to get a taste of res life. 

Do a bit more cooking at home. You find you really love cooking when you start having to cook for yourself, but a bit of a head start would definitely have helped in your first few weeks of varsity. And always remember to turn the stove off so that you don't come home after a night out, to charcoal-like mince! 

All you know about engineers at this stage is that they generally make good salaries, they work hard and a few of your cousins have engineer husbands. You imagine them fixing things underneath the hoods of cars, wearing stained overalls. Well, some engineers still wear overalls and fix things, but they're also the ones designing the cars and planes and computer programs! You don't know of any females in engineering and school never encouraged this as a viable career choice. Get out there and do a bit more research into engineers, you'll thank yourself later!

You end up being the only girl person to finish Comp Sci in your matric year. This is probably the most useful subject to you, even though it's your 7th subject. If you can, try and learn a bit more about web languages like HTML and CSS, they'll be useful later on, both personally and professionally. And Java is only one of many programming languages - you'll find out about that at varsity.

Mum gives you a book on your 16th birthday, full of advice from family and older friends. You still read it every now and then. Some of the advice is stuff you've followed. Some stuff you haven't. But you cherish the words from all the different people. A few of those special people have passed away since then. You'll remember them fondly, even more so when you read their lovely words and remember the great times you had with them.

Chanel Ball really is all it's hyped up to be. You don't know your partner yet, but he's cool. You have a great time with him and he stays a good mate of yours throughout high school. You dance with a tall blonde guy on the night of Chanel Ball. He catches your attention and it seems like you catch his attention too, as you end up dating until the beginning of your matric year. Then you break up. Your first serious boyfriend. You'll survive the heartbreak and even though you don't get back together, you stay friends.

You'll go to your first real house party in a few months. The day after, when you go to the mall and you feel a bit dizzy for no reason - that's because you got a bit tipsy, even though you didn't realise it at the time. You have lunch with that same guy at the beginning of 2015 and reminisce about that party. A lot has happened in the past 10 years and you wonder what the next 10 years will bring.

There are some close high school friends that you don't get a chance to see very often past high school. Make the most of your time with those friends now. There are some friends who you loose contact with, even though you think you'll stay in contact. There are others who you stay in contact with, even though you think you'll loose contact. And there are those friends who you don't get to see very often, but when you do it feels like you never left off. Also make the most of being surrounded by a bunch of girls, because at varsity and work you become used to being the only girl woman in the group or room. 

You meet your current boyfriend at varsity. In a maths tut (not terribly romantic, but hey, you'll learn that engineers aren't all that romantic. Just practical!). Initially he's your mate. He's the guy who you go to when you have guy troubles and to get help from when you can't do the latest maths tut. Eventually he ends up being the guy you have dated for the past 6 or so years. Just a heads up - he's a great teacher! Make use of his teaching skills earlier so that you don't have to go to extra maths lesson with your matric maths teacher in the July holidays of first year, holidays are a precious commodity when you're working! 

You'll learn at varisty that practice makes perfect when it comes to Science, Maths and Comp Sci. Instead of spending the time making notes, learning the theories and remembering the formulas rather just do past papers and past tests when learning for these subjects at school. And then do some more. And then figure out where you went wrong so you don't make the same mistake again. It'll be much better for you.

You do eventually get to see Joburg. It's not as scary as you thought and the game farms are awesome. You even end up living on the outskirts of Joburg for a bit while you work in a factory. You didn't see that one coming, did you?!

Please, don't take your privilege or the colour of your skin for granted. Your privileged high school allows you to be blind to some of these things, but I dare you to be different. Get uncomfortable and interact more with people who are different to you, even though it's more comfortable to not. Although your high school isn't all that diverse, your class at varsity is so diverse that your skin colour is now in the minority, as is your gender. Make the most of that opportunity - instead of sticking to the people you know, branch out and make more of an effort with a wider variety of your varsity classmates.

Your preoccupation with cameras and taking photos stays with you, embrace it. I would recommend joining the photographic club at school, you'll learn so much there that you haven't yet had the chance to learn (like how to develop your own photos from film). Take prettier pictures at varsity, there are only so many clubbing photos that one can have on facebook before it gets boring.

Speaking of clubs, join the SaWomEng society at UCT and get involved while you're a student. You'll get to meet other female engineers and get to partake in some pretty fun activities. Later on, for work, you'll talk to school girls about choosing a career in STEM, excited to explain to them that there is a place for women in technical, male dominated fields! You'll get to be one of the women breaking the mould and stereotype in engineering, don't be afraid to reach out to others to lend an ear, hear their story and give your support and encouragement.

You've got a really exciting 10 years coming up. Sure there will be some challenges, heart break, sadness and frustrations, that's par for the course. There will also be a lot of fun, happy, amazing, exciting times. I'm kinda jealous that you still have all of that stuff to experience and hope that my next 10 years are just as exciting as yours are going to be!

Love, 
Your almost-26-year-old-self

Goldfish Bowls to Puddles

Hi everyone, I know I've been quiet lately, but I have a good excuse, I promise. I've been sick and didn't have the inclination to blog. Last Saturday felt like I had an entire large goldfish bowl, glooping it's way around my head, resulting in constant post-nasal drip and nose blowing and watery eyes. By Sunday, it had shrunk into a medium size goldfish bowl. The rest of this week I have been taking it easy which has helped. I'm now down to a teeny-tinny puddle and able to breathe through both nostrils again, yay!

I'm still busy finishing off the last Namibia post, so keep an eye out for that. It's also my birthday month. My parents and grandparents are coming to visit Cape Town over the time of my birthday so I'm looking forward to having them here!

In the mean-time here's a little pic of how my head felt on Saturday...Has anyone else felt like this recently? 

What Do I Do? Project and Software Job

This time one year ago, I was still coming to terms with living a life where I didn't freak out every time my phone rang, worked normal hours and no longer worked in a factory. I had just moved back to Cape Town and almost 2 years of long distance for Frosty and I had just come to an end. 

I was just into my second month of my first job that my dad asked me what I did for my new company and at that stage I didn't really know, so I wrote a post on what I did at my factory job. Since I've just completed my first year with my current company, I thought that now would be the ideal time to share what my current job entails.

I am now a project engineer (well, that's what I call myself) and part of a project team with a few other members, which means that I get to deal with clients and develop software for them that will suit their particular operations requirements. In order to give you a vague idea of the industry I'm involved in, we develop software, mainly for factory environments, that replaces paper based record keeping with computer-based record keeping. The software helps to facilitate shift handovers, allows users to generate reports for those handovers and reports for other relevant operations information relevant to everyone from CEO level down to plant operator level.

On a day-to-day basis you will find me involved in some or all of the following:

• Keeping track of our project plan and status and other project management activities.
• In meetings (most of them calls) talking to our clients trying to understand their requirements for a certain piece of work.
• Configuring our "base" software to fit in with needs specific to our clients.
• Designing reports as specified by our clients.
• On Google, trying to figure out SQL queries*, python** syntax or some other thing related to coding that I still have to learn about.
• Sending e-mails responding to queries,  following up on requested information and generally "adminny" stuff.
• Organising monthly staff socials (the fun part of my job).
• Deploying bug or client fixes to client servers in order to make sure that their software is running smoothly.
• Putting together test plans, to make sure that our software works as specified.
• Every now and then, I also have the opportunity to travel, such as when I went to Italy for work (you can read about it here and here, and for the more "travel-like" posts on italy here, here and here).

I have to say that I really am enjoying my current job a lot more than my old job. I miss working with code that let me see a physical change in the factory (i.e. making a small change to a line of code could stop a tank from overfilling and overflowing). But getting to work normal hours, have weekends and be close to Frosty mean that I'm much happier overall, so it has definitely been a worthwhile change! Plus, I still get to be involved with factories without having to worry about the day-to-day issues that are involved with running a factory!

* SQL is a programming language that allows you to get a lot of information out of a database quickly

** python is a programming language, and the main language that my company uses.

The #SouthAfricanTag

I was recently tagged by the author of Closet Freedom in a #SouthAfricanTag in order to give exposure to more South African bloggers and build up the blogging community in South Africa. I really liked this idea and I'm also very proudly South African, so here are my answers to the questions for the #SouthAfricaTag. I've re-worded a few of the questions, so if you would like to take part, visit this post from Closet Freedom to get the original questions.

If you'd like to participate, please do so and leave a comment at the bottom of this post so I can get to learn a bit more about you! In addition to this, to keep the tag moving I'm tagging Candice and Jodi across at The Turquoise Teapot (you can change question 1 to tea ;) ) as well as Gaelyn from Heart of Iron to take part.

1. How many cups of coffee do you have per day? What type of coffee and why?

Usually I only have one cup of coffee per day. The first thing I do when I get to work in the morning is brew and pour myself a cup of whatever filter coffee is in our coffee jar at work, then I plan my morning and go through e-mails before getting a real start on the day. If it's the weekend I will sometimes have a second cup in the afternoon, but if I have too much coffee I end up feeling jittery and nervous, so I try to limit myself (in which case I'll drink tea instead).

2. Favourite part of your Sunday dish?

Sunday dishes vary every week, sometimes it's a meal out and sometimes it's a braai at home. But I would say that no matter what I'm eating, my favourite part of Sunday dishes is sharing a meal with family or friends!

3. What sports team would you spend most of Saturday watching while enjoying a classic South African braai?

I'm not the biggest sports fan, but I would most probably end up watching the rugby while enjoying a braai on a Saturday. Although, when Soccer World Cup fever hits every 4 years, I do enjoy getting into the spirit and following a team through the tournament! So I would probably do that over World Cup time.

4. Favourite and most annoying South African word/phrase ?

Favourite: "takkies" and "magies vol, ogies toe".
Most annoying: "jirre" and "now now".

5. South African treat?

Wedgewood nougat - you can't beat it (and it's made close to where I grew up!).

6. Which SA DJ rocks your socks?

Good question - probably Ryan O'Connor from Kfm because I listen to him every morning on my way to work.

7. Favourite SA personality? Why?

I'm not a huge "celebrity" follower, internationally or locally, but I would say that Trevor Noah is my favourite at the moment as he uses humour to address South African issues in a way that all South Africans can relate to and laugh about.

8. Favourite province? Its main attraction?

This is a difficult one. I think each of the provinces has so much to offer and it's own unique flavour. I haven't travelled to all of them yet and don't think I could choose a favourite, but I would like to say that the provinces that surprised me the most when I visited them last year were Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Completely different from what I was expecting!

9. How many South African languages can you speak?

Embarrassingly, I can only really speak English fluently. I can stammer please and thank you in Afrikaans and Zulu, along with a smattering of other phrases, but that's about it.

10. Favourite South African Song?

Dance Sum More by Mango Groove. Actually, I love all their music and I had as much as possible of their music on a South African playlist to remind me of home when I went to the USA just after graduation.

11. TV show watched by most South Africans that's also a must-watch in your family?

We don't have a TV (it's wonderful, more people should try it) and so I have no idea what's happening in the world of TV shows! However, when we do sit down to watch a series, Big Bang Theory is one that keeps us giggling for hours (the engineers in us love the nerdy science jokes that they crack)!

A Reflection on 2014

Camping at Balloch Cave Dec 2014.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all of you! I've been away for the last two weeks without any internet connection or cell reception and it was absolutely wonderful! Of course, this has meant that I've been very quiet on the blogging front, but now I'm back and ready to see what 2015 will bring. 

With a week of holiday in KZN still left, I thought this would give me a good opportunity to reflect on 2014 and do some quiet thinking before I get back to work and Cape Town.

With this in mind - here's a recap of my year for 2014:

• January - I commenced 2014 with a great road trip around part of the country and got to explore some amazing places!
  
• February - I spent an amazing weekend away at Mabula and reflected on the good and bad of long distance relationships.
  
• March - I moved from Benoni to Cape Town, started a new job and took part in the Grape Escape my first weekend back in the Cape.
  
• April - I got to explore a bit of the Karoo when we visited for a friends wedding and explored a bit of Cape Town along the Pipe Trail Walk.
  
• May - Attended a wedding at Balloch and explored Clanwilliam.
  
• June - I gave Practical Cookie it's own mascot, visited the Berg and went to Italy for work! Also, I celebrated my birthday - a busy month in June.
  
• July - Practical Cookie celebrated it's first birthday!
  
• August - Hiked to Wolfberg Arch in the Cedarberg with my Adventure Time pals and I posted a series written by a friend of mine on the 7 Deadly Sins of Falling in Like.
  
• September - I experimented with taking pictures of the moon and saw Emma Watsons #HeForShe speech which has still got me thinking.
  
• October - I guest posted over at Engineering in Style which was very exciting and we had a weekend Camping at Kogel Bay.
  
• November - I took part in the indieBerries Instagram Challenge (which was such fun) and also took part in an epic cycle around Cape Point.
  
• December - I didn't blog very much, but I did enter the Africa Geographic Photographer of the Year Competition and spent Christmas and New Year in Balloch. This year I even managed to convince my parents to come camping, so photos of this will be following shortly!

What was your 2014 like and what are you hoping 2015 will bring you?

My Favourite Things About Christmas

Christmas is one of my favourite times of the year. As November starts to draw to a close, I start looking forward to the buzz that starts to fill the air as Christmas draws near. Holidays start to seem just a hop-skip-and-jump away and the summer days start to feel lazy, even on work days.

Here are my favourite things about Christmas:

• Christmas Carols
  My folks have a Christmas CD called Carols by Kings which we would put on every year and this would also indicate that it was time to decorate the Christmas Tree! Every year I look forward to listening to this CD (and others) full of Christmas Carols.
  

• Decorating the Christmas Tree
  What's not to love about getting your Christmas tree up - when combined with carols and some awesome decorations, an afternoon of Christmas Tree decorating is an afternoon well spent!
  

• Family Time
  As a kid, I always took for granted the time I spent together with my immediate and extended family. Now that I'm older and living far from my folks, Christmas time means that I can spend some time with my family, reconnecting and catching up with everyone.
  

• The Feel of Holidays
  This time of the year, the coastal regions become crowded beyond belief and everywhere else feels like ghost towns. Either way, the long summer days and evenings feel as if they will go on forever, which is such a great feeling.
  

• Making and Wrapping Up Presents
  When I was younger, mum often organised for us to make Christmas presents for our family members. I've carried this through to present day and usually have a combination of handmade and shop-bought gifts. I love sitting with a pile of presents in front of me, ready to be wrapped. Firstly because it means I don't need to worry about any more Christmas shopping (or present making) and secondly it means I get to make my presents look awesome!
  

• Delicious Food
  Christmas is always a good excuse to get creative with food as well as revert to some old favourite dishes. One of my old favourites is the cherries and pineapple from a delicious ham.
  

Procrastination List

So, now that I've hit the 1 year mark with Practical Cookie, I seem to have hit a rut in terms of my blogging. I thought instead of trying to think up new posts, I would share what I do when I'm procrastinating trying to think up new posts:

• Trying my best to finish this course from Udacity (a site which offers free and paid courses on a variety of topics). I'm on to the final strait but every time I think I've solved the problem, the automatic markers returns my code with a message saying that my code doesn't work for a certain code case. I've been stuck on this for about a week and just want to get it working so I can start my next course!
• Getting completely and utterly lost in the world of words (aka reading).
• Preparing for and getting ready to finish off the HCD course that we started a while back as a team building exercise for EWB-WC.
• Sleeping. Or else thinking about sleeping.
• Cooking because I'm going away this weekend with a bunch of people and I'm sorting out dinner for Friday night.
• Watching cool plays (like Oklahoma at the ArtScape Theatre) and going out to dinner with visiting friends and cooking dinner for other friends.

Hopefully I'll have an epiphany be back to more consistent posting soon!

On Being A Bookworm

I have always been a bookworm. Not just your average bookworm, but one who, when she was younger, hardly left the house without a book in her hand.

There's something enchanting about losing yourself in a story. It doesn't matter whether this story is real or make-believe. What matters is the ability to peek into another world, into someone else's story, even if it's just for a part of their journey. This world could be a fantasy world of wizards and dragons. Or perhaps a real-life world of funny veterinary escapades. Or maybe a fictional world of plausible real-life experiences.

Books are the safe-houses of stories. Stories where your views can be completely challenged. You can suddenly realise just how little you thought knew about a particular subject. You can debate with world leaders through the eyes of your narrator in one book and be exposed to an underworld that you didn't even know existed in the next.

I have seen worlds that exist only in one's imagination and lived a thousand different lives, all through the pages of a book. These don't replace real-life experiences, but I think they allow me to experience real life in a richer context.

So, when was the last time you completely lost yourself in a story? 

Some of my favourite days are made up of
extra large coffee mugs, cold weather and a good book.

Practical Cookie Turns 1!

It's been a year since Practical Cookie first started. This is a major milestone. And when I mean major, I mean that I tried blogging in high school and stopped. I tried blogging in varsity and stopped. I tried blogging again in varsity and stopped again. Finally, when I was bored in the evenings in Benoni and Bokburg, I took to blogging as a way of keeping myself busy.

Now that I've moved back to Cape Town I'm no longer bored, however I find myself spending more and more time thinking about posts to share with you. Sometimes I don't post as often as I hope, but at the beginning of this year, I decided to try and post twice a week (or 8 times a month) and I think I've been sticking to that goal, more or less.

I've been told it's good to take stock every now and then, to assess where you've come from and where you're going. My 1 year of blogging seems as good a time as any to do this, so here's my list.

• Learnt: I had missed writing, until I started writing again. I like sharing my thoughts, pictures, recipes, random ramblings.
• Achieved: blogging more or less consistently for a whole year!
• Enjoy: planning my posts, sharing the places I've been, trying to figure out what path I want to take Practical Cookie.
• Future: Try to blog twice a week, do a bit more blog planning and have a few blog posts "on tap" at any one time.

My Practical Cookie mascot that I designed earlier this year!

I hope that you've enjoyed the journey as much as I have! If you want to keep up with my posts, feel free to go and like my Facebook page. Or follow me on Instagram.

A New Look!

Everyone, I'm sure by now you've realised that Practical Cookie has had a bit of a makeover. Welcome to the new look Practical Cookie. I now even have my own mascot!

For a while now, I've been mulling over how I can make Practical Cookie better and today I had an epiphany while trying to come up with logo designs - here's my initial sketch that I did of Practical Cookie (she's a Gingerbread girl) holding a paintbrush and hammer.

Creative AND hands-on

 And just in case you've missed it, here's the final Practical Cookie mascot!

I first took a picture of her, using my phone. Then I used GIMP (a free image editing platform) to edit and tweak her a bit, until my final product came to fruition below.

I'm really excited about my new look blog. What do you think?

Energy Out, Energy In

Do you ever get tired of people? Not a specific person, but just people in general? I do. When a few weeks go by and I don't have a chance to be by myself, I start wanting to disappear into the depths of my duvet so that I can process the things I've done and been exposed to. In this way I'm a classic introvert.

I love people. But in order to love them properly, I need my alone time so that when I'm with people I can give them my full attention and interact with them without getting lost in my thoughts.

In physics the world the entire universe, energy cannot be created or destroyed. It just changes state. The total energy that is provided to an object is equal to the amount of energy that can be released by that object. I think the same is true for humans. Some people gain energy from being around people and find that being alone drains them. Others, like me, find that being around people for too long drains them and they gain their energy back by being alone.

I find that the best way to provide myself with energy is to have some quiet time. To loose myself in a book for an afternoon. To chill at home and paint for the day. To bake or cook and loose myself in the activity.The quickest way to deplete my energy stores is to spend every minute of every day with people.

For the last month and a half it's been a non-stop flow of people. While I've enjoyed spending time with them and had a multitude of good times, I noticed that as time went on I started becoming lost in my own thoughts when in a group of people to try and somehow get the space that I had been craving so desperately.

The longer I spend in a non-stop flow of people, the longer the un-interrupted block of time I need to be on my own (or at least doing something where I don't have to interact with someone).

Luckily the busy times have eased up and I'm starting to be able to catch up on my "me time" so that the next time I see friends, I don't zone out or slip away into my own little world...

I took this picture of the moon peeking through these leaves
when I was having last minute drinks with some friends one evening.
I love how ethereal it looks - it speak of possibility and imagination and dreams...

What about you? Do you get a kick out of consistently being with people? Or are you someone who needs their space in order to love those around them?

If you click here, you'll find a Ted Talk on introverts that I loved.

What Do I Do? Factory Job

My dad asked me a question recently. 

"Chick, what is it, exactly, that you do?". 

This was in reference to my new job, which I'm still settling in to and figuring out, so I couldn't give him a proper answer right then and there. But it did get me thinking about what I did in my previous job...

When I was in varsity, my folks asked me a similar question:

"Chick, your degree is a very good degree, but once you're

finished studying, what, exactly, will you be able to do with it?"

There is pretty much no straight answer to these questions. As students we were told by our unforgettable Maths lecturer that as engineers, we are taught to think and solve problems.* I think that sums up pretty well, what engineers do. But it's also incredibly broad and still leaves you with no idea of what I would do on a daily basis. 

So, in a nutshell, here are some of the things I did in my previous job:

• Learnt something new most every day
• Helped to look after and maintain the software that controlled our factory operations
• Debugged code (and either fixed it myself or got others to fix it for me) when it was causing issues in factory operations, for example when:
• Valves stayed open/closed and tanks overfilled/didn't fill up - incorrect mass set points in the code
• A software sequence was stuck on a step - it was waiting for another sequence to end so it could use the same device
• Helped process engineers to optimise code by testing and monitoring proposed sequence changes with them and noting if it was physically possible or not
• Co-ordinated weekly maintenance planning meetings and followed up on planned maintenance activities carried out by the artisans
• Tracked breakdowns that occurred in the plant and put together action plans to improve the ICE (instrumentation, control and electrical) issues
• Attended project meetings
• Got called out a lot, in the middle of the night, when my team were battling to solve a software related issue or troubleshoot on the code (definitely the worst part of the job!)
• Worked on stabilising our control systems by facilitating the upgrading of our servers, sorting out licences and ensuring future projects took the control systems into account
• Helped to co-ordinate a supply chain graduate induction program in my second year (not exactly engineering, but such fun!)
• Maintained and kept track of any software change requests that needed to be sent to our 3rd party software guys
• Helped to commission some projects

This device is one of many that I had to learn to troubleshoot
on at the factory

The key is learning how to interpret the
error messages (and knowing when it's
time to replace the entire unit!)

It was a pretty stressful job, but I learnt so much from it and got to work with the most incredible team. This is just one of many types of jobs that engineers end up in. My current job will be very different from this and once I get my teeth into some proper work, I'll update you on what else an engineer does!

So, now, I hope that you have a better understanding on possible jobs that an engineer can be involved in. 

And, if you're an engineer, what does your day-to-day job involve?

*He also told us that the only three things you need to remember in life are:

1. Your wife's name. 

2. Your wife's phone number. 

3. Where you left your car keys.

And the rest of the things can be worked out if you think about them carefully enough. 

(This is difficult if you're a straight female...but I think it illustrated his point quite well:) ) 

Blogs I Enjoy

When I was younger I often enjoyed reading the books written in a diary-style, where you would have a first person account of someone else's life. A peek into their world, their thoughts, their lives. A blog is something like that and you can find the most interesting things when browsing the net.

How great is this MnM mug? I got it as a gift from a friend and love to use it
when I've had a bad day!

Here are some of the blogs that I've been enjoying - a few were the inspiration for my own blog. Others are ones that I found after I started blogging. And a few are blogs of people that I know personally and just love reading. So find a few minutes to put aside, make yourself a cup of tea or coffee, and enjoy clicking through this list of blogs. And, for those that are proudly South African, you'll be happy to know that most of these blogs are written by people with some or other link to South Africa (usually because they're South African).

IndieBerries

This blog is one of the reasons I started blogging - IndieBerries and I hail from the same small town and went to the same junior school and high school. I was a tiny little second-former when she was in matric, but I always remember her as being one of the more approachable and friendly matrics. Her cartoons are incredible - go and read some now!

Midlands Musings

The author of Midlands Musings often write emotional, raw pieces that aren't afraid of telling it like it is and making you think. I was at first interested because the Midlands is still the place that I think of when I think of Home. But I continued following her for her honest posts and powerful words. Enjoy!

Mrs D Plus 3

I found this blog (and the one above and the one below) through IndieBerries. Pretty most of my cousins are married with kids and I think of them whenever I read this blog. She offers up great practical advice and her family adventures will keep you glued to your screen for hours.

Little Miss Medic

An account of the trials and tribulations of being a doctor. She is based in Cape Town and the stories on this blog are often hilarious - sometimes you really have to wonder how some people's minds work. Every now and then her posts are splattered with some doctor-type humour, so if you have a queasy stomach, keep an eye out for those posts! 

InsideMegsCloset

Probably the most fashionable engineer you will ever meet. I should know, since I lived with this lovely lady for two years during varsity and raided her closet on numerous occasions when preparing for a night out! You can follow her adventures in the UK and her sewing stories right here. She also has a clothing range called Jemimah - I haven't had the chance to get anything yet, but now that I'm back in Cape Town it's only a matter of time!

PickingUpStompies

Everyone loves to eavesdrop and this blog gives a great account of what you can learn when you keep your ears open. There are some absolute gems in here. And, since it could be a stompie from anywhere - the posts are always varied and interesting.

TheYesProject

The concept of The Yes Project is something that I love. "When was the last time you did something for the first time?" is the caption at the top of the page. Karaoke, blind dates, swapping blogs with PickingUpStompies and rock climbing - there's always something out there that you can do for the first time, don't be afraid and just say "yes".

Hamba Africa

If you love motorcycles and travel adventures and Africa, then I would definitely recommend this blog. I had the privilege of working with the author last year as part of a committee, and we also went to junior school together (I was a few years behind him). There are some amazing articles and accounts that really make you proud to live in such a beautiful part of the world and his descriptions of the places make you want to go there yourself!