Thoughts and mutterings from @vontweeter
It's difficult to reflect on 2022 when 2021 ended on such a mixed way. With the plandemic it seems that a government job isn't very secure if you want to care about your health more than a living. The Monday before Xmas break I was "stood down" as I supposedly am unwilling to work. Nothing seems to make any sense. Here's an excerpt of the letter So I'm on forced leave till 7 February. I don't have…
I never published this previously but found it in my drafts so doing a bit of a tidy and retrospectively publishing this in October 2021 Photo update of what I've been up to in February 2016 Pepper in Peakhurst... obviously we were trying to do some paving in the courtyard: Looks like the back fence was being fenced up a bit more... this was mainly to stop Pepper and Sprocket from barking so…
No Regrets At work, there were a bunch of "no regrets" initiatives and it prompted me to think about life and decisions or life choices. Big or small I realised you could attach a "no regrets" lens to things or at least decide based on less regret! But I also wanted to look at lens by taking responsibility for my decisions and have since adopted a No Regrets Policy. At one stage I was thinking…
When organising (I use that term super loosely!) a hike, I wanted to be able to see how many kilometres it was going to be. The tool I use to use when I would travel and map a possible jog / run I would use Map My Run , so I resurrected my account to map the hike from Malabar to Watsons Bay. Part of it will overlap the Bondi to Manly walk . Create Routes or Search for a route from millions at…
I've been on the bandwagon of The Croissant Diet (TCD) for a little while. Maybe 6 weeks or so. And I thought I should document things a bit. There was a great summary by Brad Marshall on Twitter on what The Croissant Diet actually is: Eat LOTS of long chain Saturated Fat and avoid PUFA like the plague. Also avoid MUFA. If you want to eat some starch, go for it! But smother them in SatFat. That’s…
Due to the current situation where we are all at home and most public places are now closed I've invested and bought myself a sauna. I got a Valo 2 person sauna and it's been great so far. I purchased it for ~A$1600 (before a price rise due to the exchange rate). If you are reading this in early April 2020 they may still have stock here of the same model:…
My Fitness Passport membership is now live! Woohoo! So I get access to a heap of gyms and pools and classes. For someone who isn't interested in a gym membership I'm not quite sure why I have joined!! Peer pressure. I'm very fortunate that I have the opportunity to join this type of membership as then I can go just about anywhere in NSW. The membership site gives you a list of them but I had no…
I know I know. The bushfires are terrible and here I am worrying about air quality. From: https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/news/outofcontrol-bushfires-burn-across-nsw-as-thousands-retreat-to-beaches/live-coverage/6fee9931c44965d7267b10f40aa17e96#31183 I'm really affected by the poor air quality. Probably a bit more so than others. I know I am already sensitive to VOCs (Volatile Organic…
The keto diet I have been eating in a ketogenic way since October or November 2018 (I've been saying October but think it's actually November!). The main reasons are for general health given my mum and dad have both had cancer... and my mum and grandparents have/had diabetes. It also helps that generally the advice from many influencers whom I follow on social media and podcasts have adopted a…
I found one of the best examples of a privacy policy and terms of service in an app in a long time! I downloaded and installed a Heart Rate Variability (HRV) app on my phone this morning and whilst the app won't work for me (more on this below) I was very impressed with their implementation of the terms of service and privacy policy. During the onboarding it was very clear what Terms of Service…
In the past I have had a home which had a whole of house filter. To filter out all the chlorine in the home and even the fluoride for drinking. Since I've moved to an apartment things have to be a bit different as the water that comes into the apartment for hot water is already hot. Which means any "whole" of apartment filter needs to be able to cope with hot water too. It's not that there isn't…
I've now moved to Hurstville into a 1 bedroom apartment... with 2 dogs ... from a house for a year. And LOVE it. In this post I talk about some of the things I love about apartment living. I also cover some of the gotchas and what I don't like about it. 1. Security I love the secure feeling of living in this particular apartment block. I know it's not universal with all apartments but one of the…
One of my co-founders of CrowdQuests / HackSauce has rightly pointed out that my last post was saying I am only focusing on one Startup. Well I was. But then we did GovHack 2018... and started up a new startup CrowdQuests which is something I find we at Transport for NSW need and I'm sure other data hungry organisations also need. We've often talked about getting data more accurate and…
I wrote this in 2017 but never published it. Not for any real reason but just because it wasn't finished and I forgot about it. In August 2018 I'm resurrecting it and publishing it. Just in case it helps someone. A few weeks ago we shut down 99interns 😢 after a few years in the market and good market recognition. I shut down oddswop a couple of years ago (well kinda shut down. I still need to…
I spent about a month with minimal added sugar and wheat. And this is what happened... I'm sure that sounds familiar. Maybe some clickbait type headline? I've been wanting to reduce my wheat and sugar intake a bit and do some experimentation. But needed a good way to force or convince myself to do it. A mind hack. Mind Hacks I love a good mind hack. To me it's something I setup as a quasi…
Somehow I stumbled on the Magic Mirror project and of course I wanted to build it. Forget that I was in the middle of another mirror project (still not finished) but this one is now built! Here is the finished product (still a bit messy as I put a small console type table under the mirror): The console table was added... as I needed to hide the power point from my dogs who like munching on power…
I recently bought a car! Yay me! It's a second hand 2008 Honda Jazz VTi Manual. I bought the car via Carsales from a lovely lady based in Thornleigh. And dragged Patrick from work along with me to test drive the car. (Thanks Patrick... esp since we were stuck in traffic for such a long time!) It's my first car in a long time as usually the car ends up in W's name and I don't actually enjoy driving…
Since we got back from our latest holiday/vacation I've been baking bread. I'm not sure what caused my need to bake bread. Certainly I have tried it in the past but for whatever reason didn't really continue. Maybe it was because I was using a bread maker before... and maybe it's because it really isn't this hard... and I'm getting encouragement from colleagues and friends about how good the bread…
I've been a fan of square foot gardening for years. Our first one was in Kellyville Ridge where we had one bed with the squares. The concept just makes sense. Break down the spacing based on a 1 square foot square. In metric terms that's a 30 cm (ish!) square. This time I bought some garden beds from Bunnings and just used them. We have finally landed on a design we like incorporating our chicken…
I'm big on tiny houses. I suspect it's a holdover from when I was a kid and loved cubby houses and dreamt of making a usable space out of things like a car (this was when I was really really small!) or a bus or a railway carriage. Or a shipping container. In the last 10 years or so the Tiny House movement has taken off. And I fell in love with the tiny houses being built by Jay Shaffer and…
It's the little things that matter. The ones that make all the difference. One of my very good friends asked me what I wanted for my birthday. At first I was thinking something practical. In the end I requested some popsicle moulds. But I was specific and wanted the Tovolo Robot Pop moulds. Each robot is different and were very cute. But popsicles? I never eat them. So the question was posed why I…
I don't know why but I always enjoy looking at property and questioning where I would want to live if I was unfettered by employment requirements (ie need a job -- more on this later)) and family/friends commitment. Somehow I've stumbled on a thought that won't let go. Whilst previously I have thought about moving to a lower cost city or area in the future including Hobart, Tasmania or overseas…
Our trip to Montreal has been great. We're already on a cruise ship to Quebec City and down to Boston. In the meantime here are some of the photo highlights Dunn's Famous Smoked meat window Dunn's Famous - Cake and dessert window Dunn's Famous Diner (not the one downtown) Half of what is left of Will's Smoked Meat sandwich (actually it was Club Roll) I ordered the Smoked Meat Club sandwich-- yum!!…
So can you get a SIM card at SFO to use in both Canada and USA? I thought I'd share as after lots of searching I wasn't able to get a good answer. The answer is yes you can get a Prepaid SIM card kit in the international airport. Just after security there are two vending machines, one for BestBuy and the other AT&T. The AT&T one has GoPhone kits and recharge Top ups. We got two starter kits for…
Recently I've been really seeking out Almond Croissants. It started with an almond croissant at Sonoma Cafe in Alexandria. They had one in the glass cabinet and it was calling my name. I don't think I have had one prior to that for years. It was ah-mahzing! Flakey, a bit gooey and with lots of almond flake goodness. Since then I've sought it out and had a mix of good and bad ones. But then I had a…