This week my youngest brother, George, turned 30. I took the day off to go home and see him, I think the last time we were all together at home was more than 7 years ago which is ridiculous but understandable now that we all do separate Christmas etc and often meet somewhere in the middle of all our places. It was such a lovely day. We reminisced, we cooked together, and we gently bullied mum as a…
It’s been a super lazy week, I’ve enjoyed it immensely. My only real social activity was a few drinks after work on Thursday. Nothing too carried away and nothing too expensive (the main goal). It’s hot again. Our flat is hot again. I finally caved and bought a fan, we’ve been living without any real cooling but I’m fed up. It arrives tomorrow and I’m excited.…
Another milestone weeknote! I’ve managed to publish a weeknote every week for 300 weeks, getting close to 6 years or ~16% of my life. Sometimes I hate it, other times I love it. I was recently talking to a friend about why I write. I’m the primary audience; what it’s done for me is removed the fog of “what did I do?” when faced with years that seem to pass more…
We have some new kitchen bins and it’s wonderful. The old pedal bin has been broken for ages and it was too big anyway, now I have wall-mounted ones that take up far less space and it’s bringing me more joy than is reasonable. I asked the building WhatsApp if anyone did catsitting and my direct next-door-neighbour responded. She popped round to meet the lads and it’s gonna be so…
We found a pub quiz in town, went, and came second. A nice Tuesday activity, we won a couple of mini bottles of wine. Charlotte smashed the music round, 20/20. After a fairly hot week we decided to take half of Thursday and all of Friday off work to chill and do some house chores. We bought an outdoor table and chair set on Gumtree and had lunch outside a few times! What a delight. We also bought…
It was a busy social week and I’m very tired. On Tuesday Rosa had some leaving drinks and there were too many shots. On Wednesday we had our annual sports / rounders day at work and it was great fun. I participated in the tug of war and fell over several times. Lovely day out and the pub afterwards wasn’t too wild: the football was on which distracted everyone from drinking. On…
It’s such an incredibly dull thing to have to comment on but holy fuck has it been hot. Our flat can handle a day or two of heat but by day three it’s a difficult-to-cool furnace. Our lads have been melting, I’m glad it’s a little cooler. Very little else has happened. I made it to the office for some nice air con on Thursday and managed a reasonable number of drinks. On…
I spent a bunch of time this week glue-gunning LEDs into a T-shirt so I could dress up as the night sky. I gave up after LED #80, it looked good! I don’t think I’ve used a hot glue gun since I was a child, there were some real sense memories locked up in the activity. I was dressing up for a Space themed night at a Butlins 2000s weekender, this time for Charlotte’s birthday down…
This week we (Unite reps at the FT) got our first batch of flyers printed! They look great IMO. Something that became apparent recently is that a lot of people don’t know that the union exists, this is the first step towards remedying that. We dropped a small stack of flyers in each kitchen area and have had three new people reach out. Great! We also had a productive meeting with HR this…
Our last day in Matlock was a mix of working and getting internet installed. The latter half of the work day was with a far better connection, I got 1.02Gbps during one of my speed tests 😅 there are routers on every floor and still getting ~400Mbps in the attic 🎉 The cats were a lot more chill on the drive home. Over the course of the week they got more and more confident and were their normal…
It’s been an intense week, but mostly in a good way. Apart from Wednesday I’ve been working a full day remotely and then spending a further seven hours doing jobs around the house. We’ve achieved so much and the place feels a lot more like it’s ours already. The cleaning on Monday held up most other jobs, it was all pretty grim. We were surprised when the agency sent one…
I started this week well by meeting up for in-person boardgames as Scott was down in London, just nice to catch up really; chatting online is never quite as good for shooting the shit. Worked the Unite/NUJ table in the canteen, had quite a few unexpected people come and say hi. Had a chat with someone later in the day who has since signed up. Small drinks on Thursday after a busy week of further…
There’s some really weird stuff going on at work, pals. The kind of thing that makes you question whether you’re going quite mad. That’s probs all I can say publicly, but everyone else I’ve spoken to about it agrees that nothing makes sense any more. Fun! In unrelated news I asked a question on behalf of our union members in a town hall, it went down well I think.…
I have been drinking wine and relaxing. Bergerac is beautiful, the wine’s great (and cheap), and I’ve been eating a great number of baked goods. For the first day it was me, Charlotte, and Alison. We wandered around town a lot, did a self-guided walking tour, and drank a good amount of wine. €12 a bottle on a beautiful sun terrace overlooking the river 👀 Luce arrived a day after us…
I’ve had an absolutely wild week of ups and downs. I’m emotionally and physically exhausted. We kicked off with my dad’s birthday. He would have been 78 this year if he wasn’t dead. I knew him for 18 years and he’s been dead for 20 so it’s weird coming to terms with the fact I probably know some of my friends better than I knew him. It’s also weird…
I bought a spice rack, something I’ve been meaning to for a long time. Previously, all our herbs and spices lived in a cupboard and locating the one you needed was a nightmare jenga-like experience except all the blocks are made of glass and not designed to stack. I’m so delighted with it. In the near future I’m gonna decant everthing into little neat identical jars with custom…
The highlight of the work week was playing D&D on Wednesday. It was session five of my original two-part adventure, I woefully underestimated how long it’d take but it was a lot of fun! There was a very long battle in which several characters nearly died, but they were successful and completed the first little adventure. I think everyone wants to carry on playing which is great, means I need…
A short and sunny week. I hung the laundry outside and marvelled at how quickly it dried. That’s about the sum of the midweek excitement. My boardgame group did try a new game, Res Arcana , which has some fun and interesting mechanics. Will probs add it to the regular roster. Our weekend was busy: on Friday we went for dinner with Artem & Mila and got barked at by Cerberus, it was lovely,…
Two four-day weeks in a row, bliss. Not actually hating work too much at the moment, my team is doing a great job at the mo and met an important money-saving deadline. I’m back onto “playing games I bought ages ago and never played”. Finally picked up Slay the Spire, quickly realised Charlotte would like it too, and now we’re both playing it quite a lot. It’s really…
Over the weekend we went to Sheffield as a belated birthday trip, because I couldn’t eat or drink anything on my actual birthday. It was lovely. We treated ourselves to first class trains because it only cost £10 more per ticket, then ate a 10 course tasting menu which was pretty great. On Saturday morning we popped to meet Lee and family for coffee and it was so lovely to see them. Also…
D&D was really fun this week, I’m so glad I started running it again. I’m rebuilding my confidence in “making stuff up on the spot”, because of course the players are doing more and more stuff that I didn’t expect, I love it. There were quite a few drinks after work this week due to the sun. I do not have the ability to drink several days in a row any more and I…
I spent a lot of this week being sick. Sore throat, snot, general brain fog; it wasn’t much fun. I’m just about OK now but tired. I forgot to update you last week on the status of my elimination diet. I’m still going a little slowly with the reintroductions and it turns out that chilli, one of the foods I thought was high risk, is OK. I’ve also tried a few different nuts,…
Gonna keep this short because I’m writing over lunch and I feel like not a lot happened. Currently migrating all my Open Source projects to drop support for Node.js 20 which is nicely repetitive and mind-numbing. I’m also switching all my little side projects over to TypeScript now that Node.js supports type stripping . It’s really nice, I love being able to run TypeScript code…
I’ve been trying to divest as much as possible from US-owned tech lately so I started trying to migrate Yeehaw from Render to my little EU-owned VPS. Because I’m me, I ended up starting to rebuild the whole thing with some newer Slack features and it’s been fun. I ate several tomatoes and didn’t suffer from terrible shits 🎉 they weren’t high high risk. I’ve…
Adam was in London this week so I saw him a few times. I stuck to shandies and have been very sensible to try and bring my gut back to the good levels it was at pre-holiday. As a result, I haven’t reintroduced any new food for a week, apologies to those who are desperate for news on the condition of my bowels. Dungeons and Dragons remains one of the best hobbies that exists. I ran session…
Oops I meant to write this weeknote on Monday but I was too busy doing D&D prep. Then I was supposed to write it earlier this evening but I was too busy learning Rust. Staying busy. It’s just turned Wednesday. D&D is a nice distraction from everything, a chance to step out of a world of AI hype and just be creative for the fun of it. Learning Rust is a nice distraction from everything, a…
I finally had an appointment with a doctor and have been referred to a gastroenterologist, so that’s great. I’ll book the appointment in once I’m back from Germany. I prioritised my food reintroductions around a mix of stuff that will be commonly available but also low(ish) risk items that unlock a lot more dishes generally. I can beef and pork (not that I often do, just low…
Reintroductions have been coming thick and fast. I can have eggs now, to no ill effect. Bread and potatoes make me very mucus-heavy for a little while, which is interesting and probably something new and exciting. I looked into the symptoms a little and Candida Overgrowth can cause gut issues (✅), skin issues (✅), fatigue (✅), and excess mucus production (✅) especially when eating starchy or…
I can eat potatoes again! It’s my birthday and I can’t have cake so I’m eating my weight in chips. Chips for every meal: the dream. This isn’t how I pictured turning 38 but here we are. I’ll be sure to let you know if these potatoes make me shit myself or half my scalp falls off. I ran the first D&D session of a three parter that will likely turn into a campaign. Oh…
The exclusion diet continues and I’ve been going for two weeks now. I’m fine 👍 better than fine, even. Some of this could just be that I’m not eating anything processed, or maybe there is gonna be a clear trigger food once I start reintroducing. Anyway Charlotte thinks I’m happier and who can blame me – I’m averaging one poo per day which is far more healthy than……
Back to work again, and back to the office. It’s fine isn’t it. Really, it’s fine . Nice to see people again isn’t it? My diet has been surprisingly easy tbh (yes it’s early days), and it’s forcing me to be more creative with cooking. I made some pretty delicious spring rolls and a lot of what I’ve been eating is rice-based. I’ve discovered…
Happy New Year! I’ve been so exhausted since I stopped for Christmas, that hasn’t changed – my sleeping pattern is really broken and I am not looking forward to being ready to work at 9am tomorrow. We’ve been absolute bed-ridden slugs. We rang in the new year with an excellent pub crawl via 10 different pubs in Whitechapel and Bethnal Green. There were five of us in total, which…
I’ll be honest it’s been a more tiring week than a festive one, I’m exhausted. We drove up to Hull on the 23rd to stay in an Airbnb again. The lads were well-behaved and there were no tinsel incidents. I forgot to say it was their second birthday last week 🥺 On Christmas Eve we had a relaxed day, watched The Muppet Christmas Carol, and drank a little bit. Christmas was nice, I…
Short and sweet today, because I’ve intentionally done very little. We’re packing everything for Christmas up in Hull and that’s about it. Way back on Monday we had a Die Hard quiz and then our annual watching of Die Hard. It was low key, felt impromptu again, and I enjoyed it. The weekend was very quiet apart from a little bit of last-minute shopping and wrapping. We’ve…
I was in the office on Monday this week for a team lunch. We spent ~2 hours eating pizza and it was a delight. Work Christmas Party #2 was on Tuesday and I had a fairly average time. It was very quiet, I think a lot of people are sick / couldn’t be bothered. I ate and drank plenty and didn’t really need the morning off that I’d booked. I’ve been doing yet more D&D planning,…
Work Christmas Party #1 was on Tuesday and I had the best time. It was at Lucky Voice and I had my doubts but it was great fun, having the main room and all the booths to ourselves meant there was a lot of variety. I didn’t overdo it at all, I had a nice time, and I sang my little heart out. I had the day off on Wednesday but I didn’t really need it. It was still nice to have a long…
I had a lovely time in Edinburgh, it was cold but festive. We stayed in an Airbnb that had no central heating but a small electric heater and an abundance of blankets. It was cheaper than the very expensive hotels at this time of year. There was a power cut on the last night which was fun 👍 We did a bunch of Christmas shopping, occasionally stopping for a drink to reward ourselves for going in…
This week’s poor decision was overdoing it at some leaving drinks on Tuesday. Oops. I’m doing a lot of world-building at the moment for D&D and having such a great time with it. I finally decided to shell out for Inkarnate and map-making has been a joy. I have a world map, a calendar system, an extensive cast of non-player characters, and a loose plan for a couple of sessions.…
I had a lovely time on Tuesday meeting up with Andrew, Ed, and Dan. Just a casual catch up, a few pints of Jubel and then home for dinner. Woke up bright and early on Wednesday, I’m so sensible nowadays! I had a lovely time on Thursday for Alice’s leaving drinks (😢). Just a casual leaving drinks, a few pints of Jubel, then a few more pints of Jubel, then a few wines, then a Jägerbomb…
This week was very Union-heavy! On Monday we had a members meeting and discussed shared issues ahead of our company’s feedback survey. On Tuesday the reps had a useful meeting with the FT’s new CEO and then another chat with our HR rep, all pretty good things. Because of various meetings and commitments I was in the office four days this week. Exhausting , I have no idea how I used to…
Blue Prince is so good , it’s very rewarding finding lots of little secrets and solving puzzles that span multiple rooms across the house. We’re playing a little bit most nights and we quickly realised we’d need a physical notebook to write down all the clues and information. It’s too early to say but this could easily jump to the very top of my list of puzzle games. On…
The Celebrity Traitors is pretty good TV, isn’t it? I’m enjoying it a lot, it’s far less stressful and fraught than the regular series though just as infuriating how wrong everyone is. I’m living for Alan Carr and Cat Burns. On Friday we went along to a pub quiz with a few friends at a Squash club where one of their dads plays. We came a respectable fourth but, more…
We took the day off on Wednesday so Charlotte could go and look at a house. It was kind of perfect 😬 second viewing this week maybe? We took our (shared) car up which meant my day off was just 7 hours of driving, but it was fun! Had a classic “Rowan & Arjun get carried away” evening on Thursday. We both should have gone home at the same time as everyone else. We did not. Over the…
Charlotte’s not drinking in October so we went to an ideally-timed alcohol free drinks tasting. Some of the alternatives are pretty impressive nowadays; some of the wine didn’t just taste like juice and there was an 0% whisky that kinda astounded me. We followed it up with delicious pho in Viet Garden . On Friday my evening plans were cancelled due to COVID (not mine) but I was quite…
Because we missed his party, we went for a birthday meal with Luke. We went to Abeno and had excellent okonomiyaki. The week has been quite quiet. I played a new (to me) boardgame, A Feast for Odin ; it’s a really fun worker placement game with an overwhelming number of options. Other than that I’ve continued to expand Greater Cornwall in CK3 – France, Germany, Poland, and half of…
We’ve had a rotating cast of cleaners since Vanessa, our regular, moved back to Italy. There have been ups and downs, I’m probably always gonna feel slightly awkward about having a cleaner and so I’m quite bad at explaining what I want and providing feedback. A particularly notable clean involved towel animals, furniture moved into jaunty angles, and every loose item in the house…
Back in London and there’s not a nice walk from my doorstep which is sad. You know what there is though? An abundance of takeaway food and internet that’s good enough for me to play Crusader Kings III on. We’re back, baby. The Cornish people have reclaimed the empire of Brittania and I’m slowly getting rid of all that nasty Anglo-Saxon culture 👍 The richest and most…
We had a couple more days to ourselves this week, we took it easy with a few small walks. On Wednesday we drove into Yorkshire to view a house that Charlotte was thinking of buying, it wasn’t quite right but we have more of an idea what she’s looking for now. Charlotte and I finally got around to playing Ark Nova , a board game I bought a while ago. We played twice over two evenings…
We’re up in Staffordshire for a couple of weeks, working part time and enjoying being in the countryside. It’s been a good balance and I’m feeling quite happy and relaxed up here. The internet has been good enough for video calls which was our only work worry! We’ve walked over to Thor’s Cave multiple times; from here you can head in either direction along the…
A lazy lazy week of lounging around and doing not much. Obviously I progressed a lot with Crusader Kings – one game where I nearly united India under the Sri Lankan banner, and another where I kept Cornwall independent for a good 500 years (mostly by destabilising England every time they got vaguely powerful). Over the weekend we stayed down in Faversham for Hop Festival and hung out with all of…