Shannon Larratt is Zentastic

Sorry I've not been able to post the last little while. Until earlier today we were staying about an hour from Pretoria, down a long dirt road deep into the bushvelt, on a cheetah reserve. Right now I'm at a crazy over-the-top South African resort (imagine a cross between Las Vegas, Disneyland, and an African Safari), The Palace of the Lost City, trying to get my mail downloaded. It “out-Vegases Vegas” and it predates modern Las Vegas as far as I know.

Anyway, before the two and a half hour drive here, in the last couple days we've come across about thirty cheetah as well as desert lynx and other wild cats, wildebeests, warthogs, insane wild dogs, kudu, impala, caracal, rhinoceros, springbok, crocodiles, tortoises, zebra, tons of different kinds of birds, lots of little lizards, and more. It's amazing how much wildlife is here (but also how much of it is endangered) — and quite something to suddenly come across it on a dark road at night! Pictures soon…

It's really nice being able to see so many stars as well… I'm old enough that I remember stars from my childhood — I don't just mean the occasional glimpse of Venus and the bigger constellations, but millions of stars visible to the naked eye, and the bright and well-defined band of the Milky Way. These days in North America (and even in much of Mexico), they've slowly been going out as we pollute with both layers of smog and incessant artificial light. There are some faiths that believe that the Gods will snuff out the stars as the apocalypse unfolds… Perhaps we've beaten them to it?

I'll write more and post more pictures when I can get to a stable connection… and update BME — I have stuff ready to post, and will do everything I can to at least get BME/extreme and BME/HARD updated shortly. I've had a generous offer of a 512kbps ADSL connection in Johannesburg that I may take up if I can't post from this hotel — they've got wireless on trial and it's going surprisingly quickly!