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A collection of 16 posts

Finding Time

As a few might have noticed, I’ve returned to WordPress. This had absolutely nothing to do with platforms – more about separation of concerns. I needed to use Substack for something else, and would rather have something of a dividing wall between my personal blog, and other endeavours. So what

Washing and Writing

Washing and Writing

We got home on Wednesday. It’s now Saturday. The washing machine is still going. I think we can see the end of the washing mountain now though (thankfully). It’s just a case of getting it all dry, folding it, and putting it away – which we know won’t

The Journey Home

The Journey Home

We left my parents house in Cornwall mid-morning. The final hour was a huge game of backwards Jenga, where our belongings (and various acquisitions) were re-assembled into the car. Seven hours later (after a wander into a nearby fishing village, and a rest-stop mid-afternoon, we arrived home. Our car doesn’

The End of the Week

The End of the Week

It’s Friday morning – or at least I think it’s still Friday morning – and I’m taking a break from work for a few minutes. I’m actually thinking about abandoning work for the rest of the day – COVID seems to be taking a second bite out of me.

Back to Work

It’s day five since the symptoms of COVID arrived like a car crash, and I’m back working. My brain is been in a bit of a fog for most of the day, but to be honest having something to get on with has been really good. You know

Day Four

Based on the very unscientific method of counting back to when the aches and temperature first appeared, this is day four of COVID, and my body appears to be staging a remarkable fightback. As long as I sit quietly, the aches and pains appear to be leaving me alone. As

Where does the time go?

Where does the time go?

Since stepping back from posting “every other day” to the blog, I’ve discovered a paradox of sorts. While I thought having a few days between posts might conjure stories worth telling, the reality is that by the time I sit down to write anything, I’ve forgotten the stories

Spread Thinly

How is it Thursday already? Where do the days go? It feels like my feet haven’t touched the ground all week. Take today as an example – somehow I’ve filled and emptied the dishwasher, thrown three loads of clothes through the washing machine and hung them out to dry,

Running Up That Hill

Running Up That Hill

Invariably I try to get to a “good place” with programming before finishing for the day – yesterday that didn’t happen. Something wasn’t working, and it consumed me all evening. At dinner the rest of my family asked what was going on – catching me staring into space, thinking about

Running Again

I went running first thing this morning – back to the “Couch to 5K” programme after a few days off after my right knee started to hurt. Fingers crossed if I just go slow at this whole running thing, my body will stop complaining. It’s funny – for years my natural

Normality Resumes

Normality Resumes

I returned to work today. Or rather I cleared the chores, had a shower, helped our youngest with feeding animals at a neighbours house, and then sat at the same desk I’ve been sitting at for the last week – just with a different computer in front of me. The

Bank Holiday Monday

Bank Holiday Monday

The final day of my staycation started at 7am when I heard Miss 17 leave the house to go feed a neighbours cats (they are on holiday). She returned ten minutes later after not being able to get in the front door – so guess who extracted himself from his sleeping

Interrupted

This morning a gas engineer arrived to do a service on our boiler. No sooner had he arrived, the boiler started throwing error codes – triggering the most amusing jobsworth description I’ve heard in some time – “I’m only here to service – not to diagnose faults” . We realised that the

Another Train

The green army. That’s what was going on. Plyouth Argyle football club were playing at home. Young people from all over the south west were travelling to Plymouth by any means possible to support “their team”. The coach and connecting trains ever since have been mercifully quiet. During the

Spinning Plates

Spinning Plates

I’ll need to retrieve the trusty travel case from the loft that accompanied me to Germany and back so many times. It might be an idea to purchase some train tickets too. (Five minutes pass while I acquire said tickets via the magic of the internet) Hopefully travelling outside

A Few Minutes

I’m grabbing a few minutes from my day to empty my head into the keyboard. If I don’t do it now, something will crop up, and it won’t happen. Work has been busy this week – and while it helps to make the working day fly past, it’