Weeknotes #170: theatre and towpaths

Sunny travels, theatre laughs, small gambles, and gentle everyday reflections.

Week commencing Monday, 20 April 2026

View from the Chainbridge, Llangollen, looking along the River Dee. Three kayakers navigate white-water rapids amongst rocky outcrops in the foreground. To the right, the white multi-storey Chainbridge Hotel sits alongside the riverbank, its tiered balconies and glass-fronted dining room overlooking the water. A stone arched bridge crosses the river in the middle distance, backed by a tree-covered hillside under a clear blue sky.
Kayakers brave the Dee as diners watch on, Llangollen.

Quantified Self

  • This week: Stand 7/7; Exercise 5/7 and Move 6/7. (86%). Morning walks: 0/4. Office days: 1/5. Total steps: 37,451. 17.3 hours in meetings.

Life

  • Out of a job (kind of): Tim Cook is stepping down as CEO of Apple. “Here’s to the mild-mannered, responsible and rapacious ones”
  • Into a job: Sara Cox getting the slot she had been “waiting in the wings” for on Radio 2 Breakfast.
  • Quiz time. We took a gamble on the wipeout round, which didn’t pay off. That meant we were lower down the rankings than we should have been, but I think if you want to come in the top half of the standings, you absolutely have to take a bit of a risk on that round.
  • I’ve started photographing meals so that AI can work out my calories. I don’t think the numbers are accurate, but it’s much easier than logging everything.
  • Wednesday, to see Ancient Grease at The Vaults — an unofficial parody musical that mashes Grease with Ancient Greek mythology: sounds utterly ridiculous, and it is: Zeus and Hera doing the hand jive at Olympus Academy, the three Fates dressed in gold playing chaos merchants, and an evening’s worth of toga-related innuendo. No John Travolta, but some strong Australian accents!
  • I felt bad for the organisers of an internal work event this week; it would have been too much to rearrange due to transport strikes in London, so many seats remained empty.
  • Friday, I managed to secure an upgrade through the SeatFrog auction app, so I travelled to Wolverhampton with Avanti in Standard Premier. Gone are the days when you get a proper upgrade to first class for not a lot of money.
  • Saturday, from Shrewsbury to the Chainbridge Hotel in Llangollen. It was a beautiful sunny day for most of the journey, which is relatively straightforward until the very last stretch, where the road effectively becomes the canal towpath. I was entirely convinced we had taken a wrong turn until a small car park appeared at the end of it.

Media

  • Trying to stay up to date with Race Across the World. Don’t tell me.
  • A couple more episodes of series 1 of The Newsreader. I am enjoying it because I think they’ve captured the era very well.