I realise you’re sick of hearing about this, but I’m sick of experiencing it, so take it: I hate the heat. I can’t sleep, I can’t think straight, my brain doesn’t work properly in general. I’m flustered and irritable and short-tempered. At least I have an office to go to, which I did every day this week. It’s slightly too cold in there but that’s a treat considering the alternative. It’s cooler…
Hello there. Three gyms. Onion smell by the treadmills. My weight’s fluctuating a lot but the overall trend remains gradually, haltingly downward. I’m approaching the halfway point of Redemption Ark and the pace is at last picking up. Threads connecting! Events occurring! It now seems more likely that I can finish this, even though it’s going to take the best part of six weeks to get through the…
How can it already be August? Unrelatedly: how can it still be summer? Another sweltering week. It’s such a relief to have an air-conditioned office building to work from. Oh, except the building was unexpectedly closed all week so I had to work from home. The heat made me sweaty and grumpy at an uncomfortably busy time. I got some respite from my baking flat by going to the dentist and hygienist…
It’s been nice and cool this week. I’m bracing for next week . Three gyms. Numbers all over the place, and not in a good way. I slid back into Redemption Ark as mooted. Although its ratio of exposition to narrative remains unfavourable, events have begun to move slightly faster (i.e. at all) which is helping to hold my attention as I plod. I watched two more Star City episodes ( Awl in a Sack ,…
An exhausting week at work, back-to-back with a largely exhausting week of travel, has left me drained. I’ve spent the weekend slowly recharging with no commitments or activities and I’m almost back to normal. Three gyms, back in the rhythm. No net progress but I’ve shed the holiday weight like it never happened; an adipose no-op. For whatever reason I couldn’t face the epic space nonsense of…
Significantly cooler this week. Not in London, which continues to push the boundaries of fitness for human habitation, but in Iceland where I spent five nights on holiday. Zero gyms, but lots of stomping around on mud and rocks, so that’s the same. I saw waterfalls, walked down into a volcanic crater, swam in a hot spring, got splattered by a geyser, hiked through the gap between continental…
Cooler this week, thank goodness. My brain mostly resumed normal operation and spent an uneventful few days trapped inside my body which was itself trapped inside an office. Three gyms. I’m still only, like, half a kilo down from a month ago . The pace is frustrating but the trend is still in the right direction and everything feels pretty sustainable. Redemption Ark feels like hard work and I’m…
Boiling. Hate it obviously — I’m not ridiculous . Most of this week has been submerged in the woozy fever dream of being uncomfortably hot all the time. Can’t think clearly, can’t sleep properly, can’t do anything of substance, just sheltering and surviving. If we’d been intending for anyone to keep living on this planet after all the millennials die we’d be absolutely screwed. I had no choice but…
Happy summer solstice. ☀️ Two days in the office, then three days off to burn some leftover holiday before it expired. I was exhausted so I spent the time catching up on chores & admin and otherwise silently recharging. It was mostly too hot to do anything. I did make it out on my bike to Mr Bingo’s shop on Friday morning to buy a self-affirming print , and to Black Cat Café for lunch on Thursday…
Rainy and cool, the sun breaking through. I rode in on Monday despite the rain and got fully drenched. A busy week but nothing to show for it weeknoteswise. Three gyms. I’m still really enjoying There Is No Antimemetics Division and could happily spend a lot more time in its world but there’s only an hour and a half left. That likely means I’ll be breaking the seal on twenty-seven hours (!) of…
June! Cooler at last, even raining most days, escalating to wild sheets of water blowing down Bishopsgate on Thursday. I’m sleeping so much better. Three gyms. Another kilo down. I tried to watch If I Had Legs I’d Kick You and unusually had to stop halfway through. It’s probably a good film but I found it so unpleasant and stressful that I couldn’t justify continuing. Three episodes in, Star City…
I spent much of the week, including the bank holiday, hiding from the sun. I slept horribly on several occasions when it got up to 33 °C during the day and didn’t cool down much overnight. The sleep deprivation made me irritable and unfocused so I wasn’t particularly productive despite working from the air-conditioned office every day. It was mercifully cool on Wednesday evening which reset me a…
It’s too warm for me, sorry, and the planet hasn’t even become uninhabitable yet. Every day in the office this week, which has been good for mind and body; come for the air conditioning, stay for the vibes. I’m busy but in a relatively peaceful way. Three gyms. Another kilo down. I got to the end of Children of Strife , which didn’t so much finish as simply stop happening. Disappointing and dull…
A week of weird, indecisive weather. Sunny most days, but I’ve seen hail and (I’m pretty sure?) snow too. Three gyms. Holding steady. On Thursday morning I rode to Battersea again, a shorter route from Peckham this time, and back to Bishopsgate for lunch. That’s the last trip for now but I think I’ve converted myself into a Battersea cyclist; the Northern line there is horrendous and the ride’s…
Another four-day week. I spent the bank holiday Monday blissfully doing nothing. Now I just have to hang in there until the next one at the end of the month. Three times at the gym. Down another kilo this week. I’ll take it. I’m ready for Children of Strife to be over, but at this pace it’ll take another week and a bit. Back to Battersea on Thursday for training session two of three, on my bike…
A sunny bank holiday weekend. Wahoo . Three gyms. A man reading his phone, one-handed, for an hour on the treadmill. Six and a half hours of Children of Strife left. No statistically significant progress on weight loss this week. The routine is still making me feel better so I’m sticking at it. The short ride in on Wednesday was a challenge because the wind whipped up the plane tree trichomes and…
Another week of beautiful spring weather and relative peace, with five days spent in a particularly quiet office thanks to the tube strike . Otherwise, nothing doing. Three times at the gym, diligently staying off the snacks. I’m slowly, noisily losing weight, about another kilo and a half down, and feeling better for it. To clarify, the noise is of the statistical rather than auditory variety.…
Afternoon. It’s a glorious sunny weekend in east London and I feel fine. ☀️ Three gyms. I’ve made a concerted effort to avoid snacks and otherwise eat sensibly and, oh look, I’m already a couple of kilos down from last week. I think the longer, brighter days, as well as the removal of various sources of work stress, are really helping. Likewise cutting tech podcasts out of my life — one more iron…
Alright? It was 25 ºC on Wednesday! First ride of the year in only a T-shirt. (And trousers.) Three times at the gym. Exercise is currently losing the battle against the twin indulgences of Easter backlog and anxiety-induced snacking. Still, it’s better than nothing and I want to keep the habit alive so it can at least attempt a triumphant comeback one day. Children of Strife is hard work. I…
Hello. Happy Easter. 🐣 Well, that’s a quarter of 2026 already gone. Have you? Did you? Could you? Same. Thrice gym, albeit on a weird compressed Tuesday–Thursday schedule thanks to sleepless nights at the beginning of the workweek and a bank holiday at the end of it. I stopped getting up at 5:30am to go to the gym before breakfast and started going between breakfast and work (i.e. roughly 8:15am)…
I had the entire week off. Bliss. I spent it taking care of various bits of business and exposing my addled brain to sunshine as much as possible. The weather was in general worse than last week but it still had its moments. On Wednesday I’d intended to ride to Tooting to visit Next Door Baker but it turned cold, windy and even hailed at one point so I chickened out. My backup plan of having lunch…
Beautiful spring weather this week. I took Thursday and Friday off work and went out in the sunshine instead. On Thursday I had a sunny ride to Hackney Central and ate lunch at Black Cat. On Friday I popped out for a morning coffee with Marina, then my home broadband died so I cycled to Cambridge Heath for lunch at Love Shack instead of rotting and watching YouTube. All this uneventful downtime…
Three gyms. Prawn cracker on the gym stairs. A man reading a paper book, two-handed, on the treadmill. Three and a bit hours of Shroud left. On Monday I braved the Northern line and met Chris L in Kings X for AF beers — including my first ever Radler, which is not an experience that I can see catching on, but neither is it one which I regret — and wistful chat about the demise of thought. On…
It’s rainy and grey outside, thinning out the fair-weather cyclists, but brightening and warming a little nonetheless. There have been some good sunsets. I had to open a window one (1) day this week. Three gym visits. Shroud is becoming a slog, just one weird alien after another with no real narrative momentum. I’m past the halfway point so I might as well stick with it, but I’m finding it hard to…
Happy March. Come on, spring. 🌱 Gym: three. Shroud is plodding along, sometimes literally. It’s strongly reminiscent of Children of Ruin in certain aspects. It’s passing the time but I’m not finding it especially gripping. There are so many more bikes on the road now that the weather’s slightly nicer and the days slightly longer. I find it a little unnerving to be stopped at the lights with,…
Wassup. Three gyms. Chicken bones on the gym stairs. It’s actually quite helpful to have bullied myself into this Monday/ Wednesday/ Friday pattern because it’s eliminated any need to make a decision when I wake up groggy at 5:30am. Shroud is intriguing so far, although as always I’m having to push through the discomfort of memorising yet another list of made-up names for the crew of a spaceship.…
More rain, more daylight. Saw a nice rainbow from the office. Serenity now. Three gyms as per. I finished Revelation Space . It was entertaining after a slow start, and the story’s scope became gratifyingly epic towards the end even as its mechanics went a bit off the rails. ( ██ █████ ██ aren’t enough to explain why everyone suddenly became so committed to ███ ██ ████ , but I suppose the plot…
A rainy week with a little more daytime. Stress levels holding steady, but with some light on the horizon. Three times at the gym. Two and a half hours of Revelation Space remain, which (to your relief) means I’ll finish it next week. I saw my first Waymo on the ride to work. A grim-faced man sat in the driver’s seat, hands firmly on the wheel. The future! In defiance of the rain I made it out for…
Hello February. Another week of work leaving no energy for much else. I hope for a future in which my job ceases to be an exhausting zero-sum battle and settles into a calm, methodical drumbeat of productivity. It’s unclear how and when that transition will occur, and yet… I hope. It is, however, clearly getting lighter outside, and my brain’s responding in kind. Three gym visits, one of which I…
Last full week of January. Sunrise is creeping towards 7am, sunset towards 5pm. We’re going to make it, for now. Gym thrice. Seven hours of Revelation Space remain. I got my £113 back! Yesterday I considered popping to Mildreds for brunch, but a) their Dalston location has disappeared from their site with no explanation — another proud graduate of the Club Mexicana school of customer…
A busy but largely unstressful week. It’s already getting appreciably lighter in the mornings, orange buildings rising through a clear blue sky. Three gyms. I’m enjoying the escalating pace of Revelation Space even though it’s taking me forever to get through it. Back in November I started paying for Audible again on a promotional “99p/mo for three months” trial membership, thinking I could stash…
Hello. I’m still writing 2025 on my cheques. Seriously though: almost all the dates I write are in ISO 8601 format, so the muscle memory for immediately typing 2025- is strong. At least with dd/mm/yyyy (or, god forbid , mm/dd/yyyy) your brain gets a fraction of a second to warm up before having to pick a year. It’s become cold and wet. Snow fell past the high office windows on Tuesday, I got…
Happy new year! 🥂 I had, for the most part, a calm and restful week. The car rental people incorrectly charged me £113 for returning the car late, despite their inability to accept the car at the agreed time at their new location , but I’m hopeful that’ll sort itself out now that I’ve told them. Otherwise: no stress. The end-of-year period took on a different character without alcohol but I think…
Where did 2025 go? The year passed in a bit of a blur. In my last yearnotes I said I wanted to avoid burning out and keep my job in perspective. I think I did avoid burnout, just about , but work has still been stressful and all-consuming in a way that makes it hard to remember what else I’ve done with the time. I’d hoped for… more exercise, less work, more time for myself and with friends. Let’s…
Happy Twixmas. I booked my Christmas rental car three months ago so it’d all be sorted by the time I visited my parents in December. The main reason for doing it so far in advance was to make sure I could get a car from the rental place that’s a ten-minute walk away so it would be easy to collect and return. Unfortunately that location silently closed in November and I didn’t find out until they…
Welcome to the shortest day. Hang in there. More cycling than usual this week (35 km) but only two gym visits. I don’t have a good excuse; I’m just strung out by various obligations and it’s the most I could summon the energy for. I hope January will be quieter so I can get back into the rhythm. A character in Revelation Space said “revelation space” and everyone clapped. I’m a quarter of the way…
Hello. On Thursday afternoon I started feeling grotty so I stumbled home from the office and missed the Christmas party. I spent Friday in bed and had to bail on meeting Joe at the pub. I’m a little better today and it seems likely I’ll be well enough to go back to work tomorrow, which is what life is all about. I don’t think it’s the famed “ super flu ”, just a headache and fatigue. Maybe I need…
Monday, Wednesday, Friday at the gym. Isn’t it amazing what humans can achieve when we put our minds to it. I finished Piranesi . It’s basically perfect. I found the prose so captivating that I didn’t really mind what happened, but the story’s great too. I’m sad it’s over and I’ll definitely want to read it again. I enjoyed it so much that I looked into buying the audiobook of Jonathan Strange &…
We made it through November. Well done everyone. I was exhausted on the train home last Sunday and needed some respite from the external world. I pulled up the hood of my jacket and tightened the drawstrings to cover my eyes so I could take a nap. After I woke up, the vision in my right eye was blurry and I had a moment of drowsy panic when blinking and rubbing didn’t fix it. Thankfully it…
A better week, with a fair bit of sorting out. Still pointlessly stressful but it would’ve got worse if I hadn’t put my foot down. I think I’m making progress. Some kind people got in touch to be encouraging or check I’m okay. Thank you. Three gyms. One morning it was -1 °C outside so I’ve had to start wearing a coat for the three-minute walk there. After work on Tuesday I had dinner with Tyler &…
It’s getting darker and wetter outside. Three times at the gym in the dark and wet. Shit week but I had half a slice of Ole & Steen social on Thursday so that perked me up. I can feel I’m getting close to burning out for completely avoidable reasons. I’ve been tiptoeing around it for months but my mission for next week is to stop politely tolerating it and sort it out before it becomes an…
A busy week at work, therefore not much to report here. Three times at the gym. I’ve stopped the backsliding but not yet reversed it. Stress means snacks. On Thursday I had dinner with Murray at Wahaca. Their food’s not particularly special but they do have a separate vegan menu so that’s good enough for me. My roasted mushroom burrito was tasty enough and — mercifully for a Thursday night — the…
It’s November now. The heating only went on for about half an hour, but that’s still putting the heating on. Three gyms. Six hours of Project Hail Mary left. The anxiety ratchet only goes in one direction, and it clicked up another couple of notches this week. I hope one day it’ll release and I’ll be able to relax by exactly the right amount, but not today. I haven’t made an appointment with a…
It’s getting pleasantly cold outside. No heating yet. 🍂 My notes say “I love this time of year” but I already mentioned that so I won’t bang on about it. Seven times at the gym. I did not, in fact, get a grip; I just keep waking up early and I’d rather spend that time mindlessly exercising than lie awake fretting. I still appreciated the extra hour of leisure time I got this morning, and it felt…
Back to work, because this is how we’ve collectively decided to best spend the impossible gift of life, apparently. It’s been a stressful week so I’ve comfort-eaten a lot of junk to make myself feel better, which makes me feel worse. I went to the gym four times to try to offset it but it doesn’t really work that way. I’ll try getting a grip instead. The headphones are working out really well. I…
Last year I booked the first full week of October off work, then cancelled it at the last minute because I felt like I had too much on my plate to step away for that long. This year I booked it off again, and if anything my plate is fuller this time, but crucially I made a conscious effort not to care more than anyone else for no reason, so I went through with it and have actually had a proper…
It’s October. Love it. Bought a pumpkin today. Gym? Three. The beeping continued throughout Sunday night and I started to question my grasp of reality, like a man in a film taking place in a universe where the laws of nature are clearly different from ours but none of his beliefs or decisions take that into account. Although I’d already used my ears and brain to conclusively determine that the…
These are my three hundredth weeknotes. I can’t help but feel a twinge of pride at my own unbidden tenacity even though I’m still unsure when to celebrate the round numbers. I suppose the best news is that I’ve decisively narrowed Alice’s lead from 53% to 23%. I reckon I’ll catch her at this rate. On the other hand it seems unlikely I’m ever going to be able to compete with “ dog poo smells ” as a…
I love this time of year as it cools down and the nights start drawing in. I’ll be grumpy once it’s dark all the time, but for now: perfect. Last week the roads were rammed and chaotic because of the tube strike, and the increased difficulty of basic manoeuvres made everyone more aggro than usual. This week it seemed to go back to normal. Four trips to the gym. I’m failing to maintain my target…
London became cold and rainy this week. I like it so far. On Friday there were rainbows behind the Gherkin. I’m getting tendon pain in my left wrist. I’ve put it in a splint and started making a conscious effort to type less (and relax more?) to give it (and me?) a break. Three times at the gym. In May 2024 I bought tickets for a Knower gig, a few months later it got postponed by a year, and on…