All my blog entries.
This is a bit late, isn't it! Inside the Manosphere was released this year, but in March, so I'm a good five months behind the curve. Story of my life. I enjoyed it. There was a very interesting bit where he spoke to.. let me look up the name again, they're all the same... Amrou Fudl (Fresh and Fit). The interesting thing was with his girlfriend, or ex-girlfriend I guess now, who basically had…
My mother was recommended this book by my grandmother (her mother), and she then recommended it to. I've read some S. Zweig before, namely his collection of short stories, and The Post Office Girl, both of which I greatly enjoyed, though I thought Post Office Girl ended a little abruptly. It's a good read. The basic premise is that a man (Anton) keeps on visiting a girl Edith who is a cripple, out…
The IndieWeb carnival for August 2026, hosted by Chris Shaw, has the theme of purpose . Well that's a bit of a tricky subject to write about, isn't it! Only today, my mum was talking to me about a classics course she wants to do. She's largely talked herself out of it now, but the reason she wants to do it? To have a purpose . She wants to do the course because it gives her a purpose. Yet of…
I've been reading Bard's bearblog today, and noticed two interesting posts, both weather-related: Winter is not broken summer , and; When it rains In the Winter one, he describes how winter is its own season separate from summer, and how we should try embrace the winter, and appreciate that it is a separate season to summer, not simply a worse version of it. We shouldn't really be trying our best…
This is an absolutely incredible video by The Leftist Cooks, very well researched and very long that I would recommend. It deals with the cultural importance of meat and milk on the cultural right. Honestly one thing I find very interesting is the clustering of ideas: why are the many disparate ideas of the right and of the left clustered together such that if a person has one belief, they'll…
Don't you love it when a person's blog contains information that absolutely nobody apart from the individual themselves would find interesting? Well, that's this blog. In my previous weeknote I noted how I need to start getting my diet sorted so that I can actually maybe lose a bit of weight. Well, I made a bit of a diet tracker in Excel, which I'll detail below how it works, but long and the…
(This was meant to be a response to a blog where somebody wrote about the concept. Trouble is, I can't find the link!) So, there is a concept called vegan + bacon, where essentially if you want to make some improvement in your life (say, be vegan) but feel there's something difficult that prevents you in some way (your love of bacon) you could just do the vegan thing and the bacon thing, and be…
So, I have had an interesting week! On Tuesday, I went to the mandolin rehearsal. Not long before the concert! On Thursday, I managed to sprain my ankle. It was on a night out, where we were at a pub on Mitre Street (nearby Fenchurch Street). The flooring near the loos is uneven and I managed to trip on it and sprained my ankle. It hurts, as it turns out! And so the night was cut a little short…
It's got worse sadly. The numbers are: Mon 27th Jul: 7h 17m Tue 28th Jul: 1h 45m Wed 29th Jul: 2h 08m Thu 30th Jul: 2h 45m Fri 31st Jul: 3h 33m Sat 01st Jul: 5h 38m Sun 02nd Jul: 2m 04s There's one day that a bit different there - Sunday. I turned my phone and didn't use it at all. The two worst days were Monday and Saturday. Monday was because of a bad start to the week, and Saturday I was stuck…
This is a response to Bearly a diary's post on digital and manual creation . I actually have a very similar story to Cris, except that it was less prominent in my life compared to him. My grandad is very good at manual things and building, and when he worked spent his time in the construction industry. Even today he's always looking for little projects to do to build things. For instance, he built…
At work, it's been quite busy this week. That has given me a sort of naseline stress, I suppose. On the other hand, my sleep has somewhat recovered since I've been back in my own bed this week, and going forward, so that's a good thing! I was getting a bit sick of poor sleep. On the Monday and the Friday, I saw my friend online. We've been playing a new game, Ravenswatch. It's very difficult, but…
It's improved! Yay. The main thing I did was reduce my Youtube use, I think. The strict rules I set myself weren't followed to the letter, but an improvement's an improvement. Practice makes progress, etc. The numbers are: Mon 20th Jul: 51m Tue 21st Jul: 1h 58m Wed 22nd Jul: 1h 44m Thu 23rd Jul: 3h 10m Fri 24th Jul: 2h 07m Sat 25th Jul: 1h 34m Sun 26th Jul: 1h 46m (so far, but it is 9pm at the…
How long I can keep this up for we will see, but a new section of the website! Music of the day. I plan to add a song I have discovered and enjoy listening to onto this page each day. It's here: music of the day .
As regards hobbies, I find I always tend to end up with them. I guess it's a tendency I've built up over the years, and I suppose especially in my formative teenage years where I had more social anxiety: if I'm ever bored, I reach for one of my hobbies. Currently that's music (mandolin, but also trying my hand at writing it a bit), but in the past it's been language-learning, or programming, or…
I notice the past few weeks I've been in a bit of a state. I suppose polycrisis could be a word, though it's hardly that dramatic. However when one thing goes everything else seems to as well, and life just generally seems to be in a bit of disarray. I haven't slept well for a good few weeks. I have almost got out of the habit, and most nights I can't get to sleep until well past midnight, and…
Screentime stats again. I'm going to separate them out from the weeknotes, because they've become a bit of a problem . Sat 11th Jul: 5h 34m Sun 12th Jul: 4h 53m Mon 13th Jul: 6h 34m Tue 14th Jul: 3h 48m Wed 15th Jul: 5h 07m Thu 16th Jul: 6h 06m Fri 17th Jul: 6h 17m Sat 18th Jul: 8h 00m Sun 19th Jul: 42m as I write, but it's only 11 am... It turns out that the last time I wrote my screentime stats…
I run Umami analytics on my site, and have done for a few years. I actually almost never check it though. I decided on a whim to check it today, and it's a bit Interesting. Firstly, for some reason it hasn't retained the analytics from last year. Apparently all I got last year was 15 visitors in December. But this year, I've had 3.25k visitors in total apparently. Of these there is a 97% bounce…
In his paragraph entitled It's a shame , Anil states: But the adoption patterns and usage data show that even younger people are using some AI tools. And that’s a pattern that we’ve seen before, with social media. We have a significant group of people knowing that a technology contradicts some of their values, preferences, or beliefs, but using it anyway. I feel a little called out here! I do…
I'm reading an article on Reuters about Fender suing Yamaha over Stratocaster guitars . Referred from Plagiarism Today . In it some corpostooge says the following: Protecting these iconic designs is part of Fender's obligation as a steward of the brand, its legacy, and the authenticity musicians associate with Fender instruments. Oh come off it now would you. As if the corporation cares one iota…
Haven't done a proper weeknote for awhile. Would be good to get back into it more often. Thursday We had our work party. It was good fun, we did dragon boat racing (our team came dead last) and then went about Limehouse to various pubs. It was good fun, especially after we found one that had air-con! I got back fairly late but still before midnight (actually that's early for me) albeit quite…
Of course, one problem is that it's a huge problem in general, with massive numbers in question, and requiring huge populations to make changes. And of course, another problem is that it's exponential, with the damage getting worse and worse, especially as tipping points are reached, wars proliferate, etc. But there's a third problem. We still haven't completely won, even when we win. We have not…
One annoying thing about music theory is that, because the way notes are written out is so janky (twelve notes are written with seven letters: A B C D E F G, plus sharps except we don't have sharps for B and E for some reason) is that learning the major scale, which should just be as easy as remembering tone-tone-semitone-tone-tone-tone-semitone, ... isn't. However, there's a bit of a trick. If…
This morning I went for my usual bike ride to go purchase eggs from a local farm, and had a few thoughts I'm writing up here. In a way I think they're related. Speed I realised this a bit when a car decided to overtake me quite close on the journey. When we have a speed limit, people (car drivers) often feel that it's best somehow, or necessary, to drive at the speed limit. If it's a 30 MPH road,…
I have a screentime app on my phone that tracks my screentime over the last week. Sadly it doesn't go back further than that, but oh well. Over the past week here are the screentimes: 24th June: 6h 54m 23rd June: 8h 02m 22nd June: 4h 23m 21st June: 4h 45m 20th June: 4h 06m 19th June: 7h 30m 18th June: 2h 35m 17th June: 3h 39m Whoa. The absolute lowest by a good margin was the 18th, and that was…
In the same way that a lot of people like vinyls (which I have no real affection for) I quite like a CD. I think they look very good and have a nice aesthetic (think that's the word all the kids of today use) and I like the idea of putting in a CD and letting the music play. Same as how I remember fondly the idea of putting in the Now that's what I call music! into the CD slot in my mum's Nissan…
I have been thinking a little bit recently, especially in the light of the question I received relating to AI, on my use of it. I tend to use AI a fair bit now, in a way that divides into three main categories: Use at work for writing SQL code, mainly. Use recreationally for asking stupid questions, or even occasionally useful questions. Use recreationally for doing planning etc. and working out…
Having bemoaned my lack of inspiration for things to write, somebody has kindly sent a question to answer via e-mail, so I actually have some material to put on this blog! Yay. The question is this: Which one is better for programming assistance, a human without any experience (you need to teach this guy first and pay him for sure) or an artificial intelligence such as ChatGPT etc? I think the…
I haven't written on the blog much at all the past six months, and really I feel no inspiration. I actually just don't know what to write. I've got out of the habit of writing, and don't know how to resume. That's why I'm writing this. I hope by just writing something , even if useless, and pointless arguably, it'll kick it back into action. Generally I want to get the website in a better shape.…
It's not really a weeknote. It's been so long since I've written one I'm just going to give a general update. So, this year the main focus has been on two things: mandolin, and the gym. I am taking the mandolin a fair bit more seriously now, and whilst practice is occasionally... lacking, I am playing more often and making decent improvement. There is a concert coming up at the end of May, which I…
So, I haven't written anything for the weeknotes, I'll explain why. January 2026 I had a pretty boring January, because in essence all of my time was spent doing coursework for the M05. I did a few other things, like going to the opera, etc. but largely had a boring month. February 2026 I went on holiday at the beginning of Feb, and then ... not really sure all what I did. Some social events,…
2025 is over, and it's been a good year, I would say, in all. Keeping in the tradition of writing yearnotes, here it is for 2025. As last year, this year has been very busy. I've accomplished a fair bit, I would say, but also a lot has changed. I'll highlight some of things that happened this year. It might not be everything, but so be it. Opera and ballet After seeing my first opera (Eugene…
Last year, I set myself 25 goals for 2025. I don't think a lot of my goals were really achievable, and I also change my focusses during that year, which meant that the goals I set weren't really all that good. Still, I think it might be good to try to do it again, but this time of course it is 26 for 2026. I'm going to try set the goals as more realistic, and see where it gets me. Gym and Exercise…
Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday Stats Screentime: xx Average steps walked per day: xx Reading M05 study update Languages Italian German Music Mandolin Health Exercise Weight and diet My current weight is around xx st xx lb. My approximate maintenance calories would be xx kcal per day. My total calories for the week were xx kcal (xx kcal daily average). This is a of xx…
It's been a week, and I wanted last week to try to get my life back in order, at least in how it feels. Has it happened? Nope. Well, I feel like the major stress in my life still is work. I'm struggling with the workload. It's the same issue I've had for awhile: I have so much to do that I am struggling to do the things I need to do, and the things that have to get done are not what is being…
Yes, three weeks' worth of notes in one entry. My life, I feel like, has become fairly disorganised - or rather, I am being fairly disorganised, and I've ended up skipping a bit. A lot is sort of... not really falling apart exactly, but hardly going perfectly. It's really not so dramatic, and apart from the fact that I have gained a bit of weight (a bit under half a stone), it would be hard to…
A lot of my hobbies are what I like to call old man hobbies . In fact, I quite often say that I am an old man in the body of a young man, or words to that effect. I think just by the phrase old man hobbies it's easy to work out what these are, but it is things like: Gardening Playing music Listening to music (classical or the like) Swimming Learning a language Cooking Golf etc. Basically, things…
This weeknote is written at the same time as the one for the week after (W41), as I've got to catch up on them. I didn't realise take adequate notes on what I did, so it won't be great. Same for W41. Monday Coming back from the holiday, I had the day off. I went for a swim, cycled up to try get some eggs (there were none, as such I came back only with two quinces), then cycled into town and met my…
As usual, I've done a terrible job of writing down what I did. Monday No recollection. Tuesday Yoga in the evening. Other than that no recollection. Wednesday I went to the music at the church at lunch as usual. No idea what I did in the evening. Thursday I went to Hobgoblin (the music shop by Tottenham Court Road) and experimented with different picks, as well as looking at the instruments. The…
Over the course of the next... while, I want to try to slow my life down. What does that mean? Well, I'm thinking of a few things. The vademecum is the main driver of this, and is going to be a place for me to put knowledge that I won't rely on the internet for. Over time, I can shift away from the internet for these sorts of things, and try to reduce my phone usage correspondingly. My brother g2t…
In a book, Fictions , by Jorge Luis Borges, the word vademecum is used. I had not heard this word before. It comes from the Latin vade mecum , meaning come with me . The word means something like a handbook or manual , but I am thinking of it as something more like a place to store all of the information I might reasonably need. In essence: something to replace the internet. See, I engage very…
... I have not done month reviews since April. The half year has absolutely flown by. It again definitely has not been perfect, but it's been decent. Things are getting better in my life. At present, the major issue has been how busy I am. My weeknotes for the month have been as follows: Week 36 Week 37 Week 38 Week 39 ... and the first two days of Week 40 . It's been a decent month. It has been…
Again, I was pretty bad at actually writing down what I did this week. The best part was perhaps the holiday to Barry / Cardiff. Also - week forty! The year has gone by very quickly. Monday No notes. Tuesday No notes. Wednesday No notes, but I know what I did was pack for the holiday. Thursday I met my friend to get the train to Barry, and on this first day we arrived around three, dropped off our…
Unfortunately, I've not done a very good job of taking notes for this week, and I also have written these weeknotes a solid week late. As such, I'm not really in a good shape to actually say how I did. Monday No notes! Tuesday No notes! Wednesday I went to the allotment in the evening, and planted a few daffodil and hyacinth bulbs. Thursday The plan in the evening was to go to the Guildhall,…
I've been playing mandolin for a little under a year now. I've picked it up firstly just to try it out, and play it alongside the guitar. I soon found it more enjoyable than guitar, and have been playing it... off and on, where I've time, but fairly consistently for just under a year now. I feel I am still a beginner: techniques certainly still elude me (I haven't the ability to play a good…
(Also, this technically marks the end of 200 Days to Offload but I can't be asked to post specifically to celebrate it!) It's been a good, busy week, with a lot going on. At the same time, a week like this has not been good for my health and fitness etc. Monday I felt tired in the morning so I ended up skipping the gym. I worked, then in the evening cooked my lunch for the week, went shopping, and…
Monday I did a fair bit of clearing out and tidying, went to the gym in the morning, but also did waste a fair bit of time on my phone. Tuesday I went to the allotment in the evening. It doesn't look very impressive, but it is not in as dire a shape as I would have thought given I haven't been in a few weeks. Got some tomatoes out of it at least. I had a bar of chocolate at lunch, and also sampled…
Monday I went to the gym, tidied up around my room, but I don't have any more detailled notes than that. Tuesday I went for a swim in the evening after work, and that was about it. Wednesday I met up with my friend in the evening. He was feeling a bit depressed, and I don't really know how to handle people who are in a bad mood. In a way I think it was unfair of him to burden me with it (he didn't…
Monday I had a swim in the ... evening, I think? and also hoovered my room, etc. as well as work of course. Tuesday I had work of course, and also went for a ~35 minutes swim, plus the cycle there and back. Wednesday I went to another singles mixer - I do enjoy going to these. I felt fairly socially capable this time around, almost like my social skills are growing. That's good. I got a girl's…
Whoa. I have bought some protein powder, and it's amazing the different it makes to one's macros! Most days I will get 1750 - 2000 kcal, with about 80 - 95g protein. Today, I have taken protein powder (chocolate flavour with some soya milk -> healthy choco milk) and it has put me at 154g protein with 1,737 kcal - 35% of my day's kcal being from protein. That's quite impressive! This is the…
Monday Well, work of course, but I also ended up finishing The Four Beauties . It was quite enjoyable - I do enjoy H.E. Bates' writing! My screentime is still high, because I read a lot of blogs... Tuesday Work was decent - the train timetable has changed, interestingly. The train is now almost totally empty, since it doesn't stop as often now. I had a nice curry for lunch - chickpea, ginger and…