Officially disguised as a Canadian
Combine oblivious and idiot, and you get “obliviot”
In August 2025 I did a live performance for the Calgary Fringe Festival, and told this story on stage. It has been said that I am the luckiest person I know, not least because I keep avoiding death by misadventure. At times I feel like Devon Sawa in Final Destination. One evening in November 2017,Continue reading In which Randolph almost dies by misadventure with a microwave
In my post about living with autism, I mentioned an incident from boarding school: I once took a phone message for a fellow pupil to call his family urgently. His father had died. I didn’t deliver the message. When the hostel was queried that evening, I looked around at everyone else, thinking “who could forgetContinue reading In which Randolph doesn’t fit through a window
This is one of the hardest posts I’ve ever written. On a late afternoon in July 1991, I spent several long minutes in a police holding cell, at the Randburg police station, to think about what I had done earlier that day. In 1990 and halfway through 1991, I spent 18 months of hell atContinue reading In which Randolph avoids doing hard time
Two major events took place in 2001, exactly a month apart. On 11 August 2001, my boyfriend at the time and I decided that I should play hooky from work. He was a student and wanted to go ten-pin bowling. We were due to meet with my best friend for lunch at his house afterwards.Continue reading In which Randolph is hit by a getaway car a month before 9/11
When I was ten years old I almost died*. It was a Thursday afternoon at 4:50pm. The very last episode of my favourite show in the world, The Littles, was starting at 5pm and my mother had just asked me to go to the corner store and get bread and milk. I suggested that itContinue reading In which Randolph is hit by a car and nearly dies
Growing up, my parents had friends who themselves had three kids. The eldest (let’s call him Robert) and I got on quite well on a computer nerd level, but he was far more physically coordinated than me. This was especially evident in his ability to climb trees when we were much younger. Mostly I wasContinue reading In which Randolph falls out of a tree
There’s a saying that if something makes you angry you should wait before writing about it. In June 2016, I signed up my company in South Africa with Mailgun, and shortly thereafter connected a subdomain so we could send emails. We didn’t need 10,000 emails. Rather, we send between 50 – 100 a month, evenContinue reading Mailgun is a terrible company and it has nothing to do with their technical ability
One of the best sites on the Internet is also one of the most toxic. No, I’m not talking about Twitter, but Stack Overflow. In previous posts I’ve referenced my own issues with the Stack network, and a few years ago I cancelled my account entirely due to the toxicity of some of its membersContinue reading This made my day
[Last edited 5 December 2018.] A few weeks ago I started limiting my time on Twitter significantly, although I reactivated my account a couple of weeks later and it was like I never left. One network I feel more strongly about is Facebook, a company I describe as evil without a hint of irony. IContinue reading Wither social media?
Since I first heard the word dumbass, I’ve been a fan. It is delightful way to describe silly human behaviour. However, I retired it in 2006 because some people take offence at it. For one thing, it ends in an ass, which doesn’t mean donkey. That has the potential for tripping up web filters andContinue reading I’m retiring a word (tomcruise) in favour of a better word (obliviot)