#ivorpeterwilliams

Life has asked me to pause, especially with the responsibilities of caring for my dad. But paused is not the same as finished.

The journey I started years ago is still alive. There’s more to learn, more to see, more to do.

Watching others reinvent themselves, like someone I’ve admired since high school who pivoted from medical into law, reminds me that growth is always possible. That shift inspires me to keep moving forward, no matter how long the pause.

Shortly before Easter weekend my dad mentioned that a neighbour told him my old high school crush was learning to make pickled fish for the first time. She’s a year older than me, and it made me wonder who she was making it for. At our age, why take on something that complicated, risking ridicule from your mom for being a bad cook, if it’s just for yourself?

Maybe I’ll ask her how it went the next time we chat. But then again, I know it’s one‑sided. I shared my number with them, and it’s only her mom who sends me instant messages, greetings for holidays and birthday wishes. Nothing from her. I don’t even have her number, only her mom’s.

So clearly I’m not someone she thinks about.

Some days I wonder who is really running out of time: my dad, with his age and illness, or me, with the stress and demands that never stop.

He’s always carried the idea that he’s the main character, expecting everyone else to prop him up. Even now, older and sickly, that mindset hasn’t softened. If anything, it’s worse.

I still try to make his life comfortable, because I know his time is limited. But the weight of it all sometimes makes me feel like mine is too.

And yet, when I feel sorry for him, looking frail and old, I remind myself of the man who once told me he was more important than my mom because he earned more money. My mom was the one who ran the household, cooked, cleaned, ironed his clothes, packed his lunch every day, paid all the bills, worked her own job, and even tried to keep the house maintained. She carried everything, quietly and without recognition.

Back in the day, European manufacturers lived and died by top‑speed bragging rights. A car wasn’t truly “premium” unless it could hit 250 km/h or more. BMW, Audi, and Mercedes built reputations on autobahn dominance, and VW’s GTI badge became a cultural icon.

Fast forward to today, and the landscape looks very different. Most electric cars are capped below 200 km/h, because speed drains batteries fast and isn’t practical outside Germany. Instead, EVs win headlines with 0–100 times and torque figures. The obsession with max speed has faded, but the pricing madness hasn’t.

Take the VW ID. Polo GTI: a hot hatch for the EV era, with 226 hp, 175 km/h top speed, and a 6.8‑second sprint to 100. Impressive numbers, sure. But in South Africa, if it lands here, it’ll likely cost R900K or more, easily R100K above the MINI Cooper SE, which offers almost identical performance and better range.

And that’s the problem. VW still leans on heritage, the GTI badge, the red fascia strip, the nostalgia of hot hatches past, but the value equation is broken. South Africans are being asked to choose between a GTI and their kids’ education, because the sticker price is higher than a house.

Meanwhile, the Chinese brands have shown what’s possible: cars with more features, faster iteration cycles, and far lower prices. BYD, Chery, and MG are proving you don’t need to gouge buyers to deliver performance and tech.

VW’s recent moves like selling the Taigo and T‑Cross at inflated “premium” prices despite being ordinary Polo derivatives, only highlight the disconnect. They’re not premium, they’re just expensive. And when they pulled genuinely affordable models like the UP!, they abandoned the very segment that built their reputation here.

So the question is: are heritage brands still relevant?

They offer badge prestige, driving refinement, and established dealer networks.

But they also bring high prices, slow innovation, and headaches when things go wrong.

If they don’t adapt, they risk becoming nostalgia brands, loved for their past, but irrelevant in the showroom. In South Africa, where affordability is everything, that could be their undoing.

The past few weeks have been some of the hardest I’ve had in a while. Two Fridays ago I noticed my dad’s blood pressure staying elevated. Just days before, our doctor had diagnosed him with a UTI and prescribed medication. I thought the infection was the culprit, but by Saturday his blood pressure kept climbing.

Sunday was the breaking point. He began hallucinating and became manic, so I took him to the hospital. They ran bloodwork, checked his urine, and monitored his heart. All came back fine. I suspected the inflammation in his arthritic hip was driving the blood pressure up. The attending doctor prescribed anti‑inflammatory meds, and for a moment his blood pressure normalized. But once home, it spiked again.

Our GP later adjusted his pain medication to avoid conflicts with his blood pressure treatment and kidney strain. The pain eased, but the delusions and manic behavior persisted. I had to juggle this while keeping up with work, which was overwhelming.

By Thursday we were back at the GP for more blood tests and another UTI check. He was given the all‑clear, but his blood pressure continued to yo‑yo. Soon his blood glucose levels joined the rollercoaster. Convincing him to rest helped a little, but the delusions remained. He has been calling family members to share his complaints, and I worried they might misinterpret it. Thankfully, some came by and saw the situation firsthand, with him pointing at the ceiling, convinced people were “running amok” above us.

Today, for the first time, his blood pressure was back in the green. He is still a bit delirious, but calmer than before.

As for me, I am tired. I even felt sickly today after cutting down a branch from the weeping bottlebrush near our gate and burning it in the fireplace. Maybe it was the smoke, maybe the constant hot‑cold shifts from running in and out. Either way, I took the day off sick to rest.

Today, your phone is the accessory to your car. It unlocks doors, plays music, syncs maps. But tomorrow, that relationship flips. The car becomes the accessory to your phone.

Your phone is not just the key. It is the ignition, the ECU, the black box. Dock it, and the car wakes up. Speed, distance, diagnostics, insurance logs all flow into your device. The car does not keep secrets; your phone is the rolling identity.

Before the engine turns, the car checks your phone:

Driver’s license verified

Insurance confirmed

Compliance secured

No valid license, no ignition. No active policy, no drive.

Dashcam footage streams straight into your phone. Travel logs, routes, speeds, stops are archived automatically. Every trip becomes evidence, every journey a diary. Switch cars, and your history comes with you. The car is just the sensor; the phone is the archive.

And here is the crucial shift: car manufacturers have already shown how bad they are with interfaces. Clunky menus, laggy touchscreens, confusing layouts. Phones are not perfect, but they are far better. Decades of competition have forced mobile OS design to evolve into something smoother, more intuitive, more human‑centric. By making the phone the operating system of mobility, the responsibility for interfaces moves from the weakest industry to one of the strongest.

Ownership changes too. You do not buy a car, you buy a certified phone. Cars become shells, standardized and interchangeable, waiting for your device to bring them to life.

It started with a simple online game. You pick a block, thinking luck decides your reward.

Expectation: my choice matters.

Reality: the outcome was already locked in. Your click only changes how the reveal looks, not what you get.

And once you notice that, you start seeing it everywhere online:

Checkout donations on e‑commerce sites

Expectation: I’m being generous.

Reality: you gain nothing. No name, no credit, no tax deduction. The company takes your pennies, turns them into tax breaks and PR, and you vanish from the story. It’s theatre of generosity, with you as the prop.

Digital discounts and flash sales

Expectation: I’m getting a deal.

Reality: the “discount” is manufactured. Yesterday’s price was inflated, today’s cut is staged. You’re not saving - you’re being framed into spending.

Streaming recommendations

Expectation: I’m choosing freely from endless options.

Reality: algorithms decide what you see next. Your “choice” is guided by engagement metrics, not your taste. The freedom is scripted.

Partisan news feeds

Expectation: I’m comparing perspectives.

Reality: both sides cherry‑pick facts to fit their agenda. Same footage, different framing. You’re not comparing truth — you’re comparing curated slices of reality.

Lottery draws

Expectation: I can see the randomness.

Reality: the tumbling balls and live auditors are gone. Digital RNGs decide invisibly, with plays locked before the draw. Trust has shifted from what you can watch to what you’re told to believe.

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The thread running through all of this: agency is simulated, not real. You’re nudged into thinking you’ve acted meaningfully - chosen a prize, donated to charity, picked your news source, watched a draw - but the outcome was predetermined by opaque digital mechanisms.

It’s not always malicious. Sometimes it’s about efficiency or compliance. But the psychological trick is powerful: you feel empowered, while the system gains control, profit, or legitimacy.

I just read about TRG‑035, a new drug being tested in Japan that can regrow natural teeth. Not implants, not dentures — actual teeth, with roots, nerves, and blood supply.

And it got me thinking about what the future could look like if this works, and if similar advancements follow:

No more teeth with gaps.

No more missing teeth.

No more dentures.

No more fillings or crowns.

If a tooth rots or breaks, you don’t patch it. You simply pull it — and grow a new one in its place.

That’s not science fiction anymore. TRG‑035 is already in human trials, and other research is exploring stem‑cell regeneration and even bioprinting enamel. Together, they point to a future where dentistry isn’t about repair, but about renewal.