Tag: weeknotes

Week commencing Monday, 30 June 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 5/7; Exercise 6/7 and Move 6/7. (81%). Morning walks: 0/3 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 2/5. Total steps: 78,733

Life

• Despite many things I have written about being – or not being – in the office for work, I did two days; my step count shows it.
• It also helped, as the office is air-conditioned. This week has been very hot; the fan was needed in my home office, and lots of water was consumed.
• We’ve had the government for a year. Has anybody noticed anything different? Where are the promised changes?
• Robot update: the robot hoover ran on Monday, quite impressively mapped the room, and bumped into everything.
• Tuesday, to Sohoplace to see The Fifth Step, a play about how people handle their demons in the context of alcoholism and recovery. It stars Martin Freeman and Jack Lowden. It’s good and thought-provoking. 3/5 stars from me.
• Wednesday: divisional all-hands meetings. But drinks in the evening with Mark B. Very glad I was able to catch him while he was in the country.
• Related: I was delighted that I kept an eye on the time and did not miss the last trains from Shepherd’s Bush.
• Thursday was another office day. And more drinks in the evening with Andrew and Sarah. It was nice to sit outside. And now we know why A went to a Taylor Swift concert.
• Friday to Central London. Dinner on Argyll Street was timed to finish just before Rachel Zegler appeared as Eva Perón on the balcony of The Palladium Theatre. Much more impressive than I thought. And they had to close the roads for the twenty minutes the crowd is there. It will be interesting to see it from inside the theatre next week.
• Saturday, Pride. The Big Gay Brunch was fun, but too early for even non-alcoholic drinks. The breakfast buns were excellent.
• Related: Phil found a route around the parade so we could get across to Piccadilly, avoiding crowds. It’s quite impressive how quiet London can be, even two streets back from a million people.
• Dinner at Meson Don Felipe. Excellent food. We felt a bit ignored by the staff.
• Sunday, Country on the Common. It rained on the way in, the bar staff managed to ignore me, and I was not feeling the vibe. Left and took a train to look at the river. Headliner Noah Reid had withdrawn from the event. I notice no refund was offered.

Media

• The All Out podcast with Jon Dean: Keegan Hirst | The Rugby Locker: Coming Out of it Alive
• How To Fail with Elizabeth Day: Nick Grimshaw

Week commencing Monday, 23 June 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 2/7; Exercise 3/7 and Move 5/7. (48%). Morning walks: 0/3 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/4. Total steps: 44,057

Life

• The weather was still wonderful on Monday. We had our now-traditional post-festival brunch at The Dell Café. Delicious. Then we tried one of the new coffee shops on the Esplanade. Very busy with festival-goers en route back to the mainland.
• Related, the Hovertravel queue was long, but the FastCat had plenty of room. The onward connection to London was delayed considerably. Another “delay repay” situation.
• Wednesday’s 80s nostalgia: Just For One Day: The Live Aid Musical. It’s a high-energy celebration of Live Aid’s iconic music, featuring amazing vocal performances and reinterpretations of 1980s music, avoiding look-alike impersonations. The storytelling might lack some nuance now so much time has passed, but that didn’t spoil it.
• Thursday, drinks at The Ship Tavern near my old Holborn office. Bouldering and powerlifting were on the television screens in the pub. Neither strikes me as a big sporting event.
• Friday, not much more the specialist thinks he can do about my cough. They did discover I have a slight allergy to dust mites. That was the excuse I’ve been looking for to order the robot hoover.
• Barbecue at home. There was a lot of cleaning to do in the morning, which was a shame since the robot had not arrived yet.
• It was delivered on Sunday, but remained in its box.

Media

• Game Changers Radio: “52 per cent of Australians aged 10 and older say they listen to podcasts each month” – that seems like a high percentage to me, but apparently not.
• Rylan: How to Be in Love: Stephen Fry: From 15 years of celibacy to finding love – fascinating episode. Stephen Fry describes his teenage experience of love as a “tempest of feeling”, later suggesting “cheerfulness” is a crucial, often overlooked virtue that significantly improves a relationship. We should all take that advice.
• We have run out of episodes of Murderbot and need some more episodes to drop.
• For some reason, I binged YouTube videos where Good Morning America were preparing to move from their Times Square studios. No idea why I watched so many … but that’s the algorithm for you.
• I also discovered My Tiny Estate. There are a lot of those to keep me busy.

Week commencing Monday, 16 June 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 5/7; Exercise 4/7 and Move 5/7. (67%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/4. Total steps: 58,922

Life

• Monday, a heatwave was predicted. Turned out to be a good sign for the week, and it explains the survey I got asking about how I cope in hot weather. I’m fine. The weather stayed hot.
• Meanwhile, across the world, Britons in Israel were told to notify the Foreign Office to receive instructions on how to leave.
• We have a bad mobile signal in London. But I am not sure we are being lied to, are we?
• Related: I actually got a mobile signal on the train to Waterloo on Thursday, and it allowed me to buy a railcard when I discovered mine had expired minutes before I needed it.
• Great description of AI from Little, Yellow, Different: “It’s like having a writing partner who’s read every book ever written but occasionally thinks your grocery list needs footnotes and a bibliography.”
• Random wish of the week: I wish Apple Podcasts showed when I’d listened to a podcast.
• Isle of Wight Festival. Highlights: Lottery Winners, Paul Heaton, Björn Again, Midge Ure, and the bit of Texas that I managed to hear from the back. Lots of other good stuff, though.
• Related: we didn’t stay for the headliners on any day. PY was more disappointed that Sky Arts wasn’t showing Justin Timberlake than I was.
• Relatedly related: Festival Diaries: Day One, Day Two and Day Three.

Media

• Murderbot: I mentioned before that my childhood television upbringing has made me particularly fond of computers with human-like qualities. I think that’s what appeals about this show to me.
• The Race Across The World reunion made me wish that there was a lot more of the series. I also really wish they’d do a behind-the-scenes show because it must be fascinating to be part of the camera crew embedded with the contestants.

Week commencing Monday, 9 June 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 2/7; Exercise 2/7 and Move 2/7. (29%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 32,246

Life

• PY published his book on Amazon. This is fantastic. Go read it. I think there will be a free offer next week! I am very proud of all his efforts. So exciting.
• They’re all doing books now: Ari Paparo has written one detailing the transformation of digital advertising through ad exchanges, Google’s market dominance, and publishers’ countermeasures. But it’s not available at the moment. I pre-ordered. Niche audience, I imagine.
• Apple held an event. Something about a new design language for Apple devices. Also, the iPad got better. It’s interesting how these launches have started to blend into one another, like déjà vu in product form. Sometimes I wonder if we’re moving forward or just refining the same ideas endlessly.
• I went to the office on Tuesday and then stayed at home, a lot. I get that look when I start coughing. It’s nothing contagious, folks! You know, that look that silently says, “Stay back!” Honestly, I’m more frustrated by it than anything else.
• Related, the emergency communication button is broken in one of the lifts. So, there’s a radio to contact somebody if help is needed. Never seen this, but a clever way to keep the lift in service.
• I had to go to the Spanish consulate on Wednesday morning. I went through security to discover I was an hour early and had to sit in a cafe having a coffee until time ticked around.
• There was a US military parade on Sunday, but it seems like America is more divided than ever. I wonder when ‘seeing it from the other side’ actually went out of fashion? Not good for the world. It’s sad to see how quickly empathy seems to have faded from public discourse. Maybe we’ve forgotten that understanding the other side doesn’t weaken us — it’s what holds us together.
• Meanwhile, this is the week the war in the Middle East came a step closer: Israel says Iran has fired up to 100 missiles in retaliation for surprise assault while fresh explosions reported at airport in Tehran. It’s a bit scary, really.
• I spent most of the weekend in bed listening to more podcasts.

Media

• It was the end, but the episode started 1,200km from the finish line, Race Across The World. I loved everything about this series.
• We started watching Murderbot. It’s not usually my kind of thing, but this is good. Binge-worthy.
• We started season two of The White Lotus and it’s just as disturbing as the first series.
• I have made it into 2025 for Melbourne Radio Wars, and I am nearly up to date. There’s great chemistry between Irene Hulme, Wade Kingsley and Craig Bruce, which is why it’s so engaging even from afar.

Week commencing Monday, 2 June 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 1/7; Exercise 1/7 and Move 1/7. (14%). Morning walks: 0/5, Office days 0/5. Total steps: 22,888

Life

• I felt awful all week: a relentless cough combined with a lingering cold really knocked me about. There were moments when I wondered if I’d ever sound normal again. The combination of the cough and whatever cold-like illness I caught at the end of last week was very unpleasant. At times, the cough was continual, loud and distressing. I can’t imagine what the neighbours thought. My Quantified Self numbers (above) speak for themselves.
• I avoided the office for fear of being sent home, but also because I didn’t want to be that person coughing through every meeting.
• Related, it was disappointing to miss Tai Chi and a Breland concert I’d been looking forward to. I guess guilt and illness make for a heavy combination. I kept wondering if I was being overly cautious or simply sensible.
• The online Volunteering Forum on Tuesday was well run and very engaging. I am glad there are some new ideas in the programme, even if everybody’s favourite part, the summer scheme, has been closed. I can listen while muted, and the cough disturbs nobody. And, unlike work calls, this was a camera-off event so nobody saw me go red every time I coughed.
• Midweek, The New European rebranded as The New World: “We’re not rebranding because Brexit’s over – we’re rebranding because Brexit was just the beginning”.
• Saturday was the first day I ventured out this week — lovely Korean meal with friends. I managed to get through the early evening dinner without excessive coughing.
• Related, on the walk back along The Beeline Way between New Malden and Raynes Park, I noticed The Bug Hotel, designed to provide nesting sites for carpenter and leafcutter bees. Nice.
• I walked to and from Wimbledon on Sunday, still sounding like a sea lion on occasion. The fresh air helped clear my head, even if my throat wasn’t quite ready to join the conversation.
• Last week, I sent an application for something. No idea if it was the right move or just a hopeful stab in the dark. Sometimes you have to throw your hat in the ring and see what happens. Cryptic.

Media

• I consumed a lot of media while ill. The two Ed Milliband episodes of The Rest Is Politics Leading were really good: Ed Miliband: Why I Challenged My Own Brother, Untold Blair-Brown Stories, & Why I Lost In 2015 and Ed Miliband: Why Blair & Farage Are Wrong About Net Zero
• I finished the DownieLive season We took the TRAIN from the Arctic to Africa. Thoroughly recommended.
• Last year, I started listening to Game Changers Radio: Melbourne Radio Wars but, for some reason, stopped. While I have been at home so much this week, I’ve binged several months’ worth of catching up. Despite being across the world, it’s riveting.
• I discovered who @BennyDrama7 was this week, thanks to the Prime Series Overcompensating: a story following Benny, a former high school jock and closeted college student, through his freshman year. We completed the series.

Week commencing Monday, 26 May 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 5/7; Exercise 5/7 and Move 5/7. (71%). Morning walks: 2/3 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 44,581

Life

• Monday was a bank holiday. I took Mum and Dad to the station before heading home. It’s always sad when they go. Their train was very full, so I was relieved to hear they’d found a seat. Less impressed by the station security people who tried to move me on from waving them off.
• In the evening, to the Odeon Cinema in Wimbledon to see Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme. I love his deadpan style, meticulously styled cinematography, and symmetrical compositions. Another great film that looked stunning.
• The plot? It’s a dark comedy that follows wealthy businessman Zsa-zsa Korda, who appoints his only daughter, a nun, as sole heir to his estate. Later, they must fight off scheming tycoons, foreign terrorists, and assassins. So, just your everyday tale.
• Thirsty Thursday happened this week, but instead of standing outside the same pub all night, we went for some food and sat outside a different pub! The food was delicious. It was good to break the pattern – a small change that made the evening feel different.
• While I was doing that, PY was on The Island, finally resolving the electricity meter problem. Wonderful news.
• I woke up on Friday with what I thought was a cold, which has the additional impact of making my cough worse. I was not very well.
• But I managed to get out of the house to see The Crazy Coqs sing Celine Dion. And, as I was feeling a bit better and we got 20% off at The American Bar, we had a drink there before heading home.
  I was glad I made the effort – the singers were terrific, and it felt like reclaiming the tail end of the week.

Media

• I discovered a fantastic YouTube series by a creator travelling from the Arctic to Africa by train and binged the first three episodes: Downie Express: Arctic to Africa. It’s well done. Episode 4 drops next week.
• I caught up with an old series, DownlieLive Travels by Train: America, which was similarly well produced.

Week commencing Monday, 19 May 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 7/7; Exercise 4/7 and Move 7/7. (86%). Morning walks: 1/5 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 0/5. Total steps: 56,823

Life

• On Monday, I underwent a CT scan related to my cough. It was over quite quickly. I’m not sure how I felt about it. I think I was expecting it to feel like more of a moment, but instead it was just something that happened, and then it didn’t.
• Relatedly, on Thursday, I had a lung function test. I had no idea I could breathe out for so long. It was their first appointment of the day, and the clinic was locked when I arrived. Eventually, I was let in, and it was all over quickly—if a fifteen-minute wait for a test dose of medication counts as fast. There’s something faintly ridiculous about being coached through deep breathing at 8:30 in the morning.
• Monday evening was another of our monthly visits to the pub quiz. Ben joined us, so it was a team of five. Inexplicably, we came second, which means there’s a round of drinks next time we go!
• Mum and Dad arrived on Thursday and visited the Chelsea Flower Show on Friday. I thought they’d be more impressed with the dig garden than they were. So, we took them to a garden centre on Sunday.
• On Saturday, we took a bus to Wimbledon Village, tried empanadas at the shop on the high street, went for a walk to Wimbledon Common, stopped for a drink at Canizaro House, and bussed home.
• The cheese came out again, and we had leftover Eurovision cheese fondue and raclette. It was delicious. We’re now in that post-Eurovision phase where leftover cheese becomes its own food group.
• Friday night was Scissor Sisters at the O2 with PY and Mark. Before the show, the drinks in the O2 Blue Bar were nice, and we had excellent seats. Scissor Sisters were fantastic. I wish I had just a small portion of Jake Shears’s energy.
• And, just before they are to be taken back into national ownership, SWR announced superfast onboard WiFi—but only as far as Basingstoke (which won’t help my south coast commutes)!
• The New European: “Inexplicably, energy cooperation – which is essential to the UK’s future economic growth – has attracted barely a tenth of the column inches as has fishing, an industry which employs fewer full-time fishers than there are tattooists in the UK. But any long-term EU deal needed to explore these questions.”

Week commencing Monday, 12 May 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 7/7; Exercise 6/7 and Move 7/7. (95%). Morning walks: 4/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 64,365

Life

• I pay for one of those insurance policies that sends somebody to fix plumbing or electrical issues. I’d booked someone to fix the sensor that turns on the bathroom light. It needed replacing. But now it turns off too quickly, and I don’t think I’m covered for another call-out.
• Related: it’s not a setting on the sensor.
• I went to see a consultant about my cough. More tests are booked. It’s getting (slightly) worse. It was a lovely walk up to the hospital.
• Tuesday and Thursday evenings were Eurovision semi-finals. They were a lot more fun than I remembered and gave me a chance to see the songs before Saturday.
• Saturday was the Eurovision party. The weather was nice, so people could sit outside if they weren’t that keen on watching. We rigged up multiple speakers.
• Related: we retrieved the lockdown projector and projected the image onto the kitchen units for those at the end of the room.
• My slow-cooker bean chilli with vegan cheese was a huge success and very easy to prep in advance.
• We didn’t get the cocktails in a can out early enough, so most people didn’t know we had them.
• The winner was Austria with the song Wasted Love, performed by JJ. The Austrian in the room was very happy.
• Work-related: How can traditional British TV survive the US streaming giants?, and Microsoft is – again – killing an advertising product. I know what it’s like; if I can help anybody affected, contact me.

Media

• The sixth episode of Doctor Who was watched on catch-up on Sunday. The Interstellar Song Contest featured the Doctor and Belinda attending a futuristic Eurovision-style song contest and a plot to kill trillions of people. Cameos by Rylan Clark and Graham Norton were quite good.

Week commencing Monday, 5 May 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 5/7; Exercise 2/7 and Move 4/7. (52%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 38,784

Life

• A quiet week. White smoke was rising.
• A lazy bank holiday. We walked into Wimbledon, picked up steaks, and not much else.
• My local Co-op still has empty shelves after the cyberattack. It’s odd.
• I skipped our Cinco de Mayo social and spent the evening on a train to Portsmouth Harbour. Glad it ran to time.
• The ferry to the Island was busy, but fine.
• We spent most of Saturday in the sunshine with drinks, watching the kite surfers. A proper sunny day.
• Sunday breakfast at RT Café Grill was delicious. We sat outside and soaked up the weather.

Media

• Conclave is a Vatican thriller directed by Edward Berger. Ralph Fiennes plays Cardinal Thomas Lawrence, overseeing a secretive 72-hour papal election. Timely, and very enjoyable.
• The best transport for cities: trams?
• Doctor Who: The Story and the Engine mixed African folklore with classic Who mythology. I really liked this one.
• Still loving Race Across the World, this time from Sanya to Shangri-La. As always, beautifully shot.

Week commencing Monday, 28 April 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 3/7; Exercise 4/7 and Move 4/7. (52%). Morning walks: 0/4. Office days 1/5. Total steps: 45,714

Life

• It’s been almost two years since the King’s Coronation. PY and I spent part of the day volunteering as wayfinders for visitors on the South Bank. In January, we were delighted to learn that volunteers had been awarded a Coronation Medal—a longstanding tradition dating back to King Edward VI in 1547. We collected ours on Tuesday.
• We had a ‘happy path’ discussion at work, aiming to understand the ideal workflow without failures and to facilitate early testing. It’s a concept that always amuses me, and thirty minutes was too short a time to reach a solution.
• Drinks on Thursday night, where I was (almost) persuaded to apply for an old job, but I think that was just the combination of drinks and good friends.
• Saturday, to Woking, for a family barbecue, where there was too much fantastic food. Nice to see everybody. Way too stuffed to eat in the evening, but we could catch up on Doctor Who.
• Sunday, to see Titanique, a jukebox musical blending the story of the Titanic with the music of Céline Dion. It’s a comedic take on the film; Céline Dion is portrayed as having survived the sinking of the Titanic. Enjoyable and much funnier than I expected.

Media

• In End of the Street Linda Melvern tells how Rupert Murdoch moved his newspapers from Fleet Street to a new, technologically advanced plant in Wapping, bypassing traditional union agreements, triggering a major industrial dispute marked by mass picketing and violent clashes. Ultimately, the move broke the power of the print unions and transformed the British newspaper industry. It’s a story of making a big business change and its brutal consequences.
• Lucky Day is the fourth episode of the current Dr Who series in which The Doctor and Ruby fight an anti-UNIT conspiracy theory and a campaign of disinformation against them. Set in the current year, bits of it felt too real. The Little Mermaid’s Prince Eric was the villain.

Week commencing Monday, 21 April 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 5/7; Exercise 5/7 and Move 5/7. (71%). Office days 1/4. Total steps: 56,504

Life

• Lovely Monday morning in Shrewsbury, and a train home the long way around because of engineering works. The train from Moor Street was busy, but we secured a seat, and that’s all that is really needed.
• A not-so-secret leaving drinks happened on Friday night. A colleague is going for the second time, so I didn’t want a big event—delightful time with nice people.
• Friday, to a small theatre in Lower Marsh to see The Rise and Fall of Vinnie and Paul, a musical based on Paul Gauguin’s turbulent cohabitation with Vincent van Gogh in 1888. Van Gogh’s infamous breakdown and the severing of his ear ended the piece. A truly intimate, small show—really well done.
• Our Saturday cheese adventure started at Fortnum and Mason and ended in Neal’s Yard. There was much delicious cheese and some fizz.
• Another new musical on Saturday, Stiletto: set in 18th-century Italy, follows Marco, a castrato singer, and Gioia, a talented black woman, whose love story is challenged by a murder. I learned the non-show meaning of Stiletto as part of this experience. Also, brilliant and deserves wider recognition.
• To the Actors Church in Covent Garden for Songs I’ll Never Sing, a charity concert featuring West End performers singing songs outside their typical range, in aid of Chicken Shed and The Brain Tumour Charity. Always great singers, but it does feel quite wrong drinking alcohol in a church pew.

Media

• I started it at the weekend, and by Tuesday I’d finished Careless People, a memoir by Sarah Wynn-Williams, a former New Zealand diplomat who joined Facebook and was there while I was. The book reveals a very different view of the company’s culture than I experienced, but the more I hear about things that happened around that time, I am beginning to think I was very sheltered.

Week commencing Monday, 14 April 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 3/7; Exercise 2/7 and Move 3/7. (38%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 37,770

Life

• My quantified self metrics are some of the lowest I’ve had. This cough is affecting me more than I care to admit. I need to get out and about for some exercise.
• The simplified version of the software, for speed, is far from simple, but we should continue to push for it.
• I finally photographed my 2024 reading list. The books can now be rehomed, although some will remain by the bookshelf, waiting for a charity shop run.
• I made the wrong call when the train was delayed. We should have taken the risk of the short interchange at Birmingham International, as we would have made it, and it would have arrived first. I’ll try the delay repay, but I bet they see this train still ran.
• Attingham’s Easter egg trail was a lot of fun. I wore paper bunny ears all the way around. The lady who said to me that we have to do these things for our grandchildren did not make me feel young. The rest of the family laughed for the rest of the day.
• My niece and nephew were braver on the climbing walls than I would have been. But I watched with a coffee and a flapjack and felt very safe.
• The walk around Cole Mere was lovely. The Llangollen Canal looked very peaceful.

Week commencing Monday, 7 April 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 4/7; Exercise 3/7 and Move 3/7. (48%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 36,322

Life

• When I asked my doctor if I should try to use my private medical, she didn’t hesitate to recommend it. I found out the process, but didn’t jump to use it.
• Pub quiz week: Joint 7th sounds poor but is, in fact, excellent—like winning. Our musical round was a let-down, and I missed the obvious Boney M song in the mix.
• The Technical Design Authority review meeting missed a crucial piece of data, resulting in many extra meetings and work this week (and probably next).
• The weather has been decent this week. On Thursday, we were able to eat lunch while sitting on the balcony, looking at the high-rise buildings being constructed around White City.
• Drinks with commercial colleagues at the Exmouth Arms near Euston on Thursday evening. It’s a little hidden away and turned out not to be as rammed as some pubs we had walked past. We secured some seats inside and, later, a booth. A very impressive list of beers is available, so I am not sure why I went for the Madri: I guess it is a known quantity.
• On Saturday, we attempted to make Chinese dumplings: it was much harder than it seemed, although the handmade ones were better than those made with a plastic crimping tool.

Media

• Friday, I was a bit tired and had an evening to myself. I’ve been rewatching episodes of The Blacklist. I am now at the point, towards the end of series 2, where I stopped watching when it was initially on Sky. All the episodes will be new to me from now on, but I am glad I rewatched them as I’d forgotten the backstory. I thought I’d settle in and watch a couple of episodes before I made dinner. Instead, I binged on eight episodes back-to-back, something I doubt I would ever have been able to do before streaming.

Week commencing Monday, 31 March 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 2/7; Exercise 2/7 and Move 2/7. (29%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 30,482

Life

• Dad chased a missing birthday gift for PY that was dropped at a local shop. No luck. We’ll keep chasing.
• I wrote something that reflected on Facebook/Meta’s high standards for product success, which was really reminiscing about the Meta Portal, an excellent photo frame and calling device.
• Workwise, I attended a lengthy work session discussing apprenticeships, which was more interesting than I imagined.
• Wednesday, I caught up with US tariff predictions and ended the day feeling low about the news.
• Thursday was Thirsty Thursday again: an evening out at The White Horse where we tried to chat with ChatGPT about our personas.
• Friday, I woke feeling ill with a persistent cough, so I cancelled next week’s Blood Donor session, but managed to get through the day.
• Saturday: I enjoyed a lazy morning despite feeling under the weather. I called Mum and Dad about their anniversary flowers and booked train tickets for an Easter break trip to Shrewsbury.
• Annoyingly, I discovered that AudioBoom no longer publicly hosts some radio clips I wanted to listen to. It’s time to see if I can recover them from AWS.
• Saturday night, met up with friends in Balham for oysters, sharing plates and garlic prawns.
• Took an afternoon walk on Cannon Hill Common, enjoying a moment watching local wildlife.

Media

• Monday night was quiz night again, with Mastermind, new players for this week’s Chess Masters and UCL vs the Open University on University Challenge taking our evening.
• Later in the week, I was introduced to The Residence, a fantastic whodunnit story on Netflix.

Week commencing Monday, 24 March 2025

Quantified Self

• This week: Stand 7/7; Exercise 2/7 and Move 6/7. (71%). Morning walks: 0/4 (days in the office don’t count). Office days 1/5. Total steps: 56907

Life

• Monday, attended One Night in Bohemia, a Jonathan Larson tribute concert at the Phoenix Arts Club. An energised performance featuring a standout cast, raising funds for the National AIDS Trust.
• Tuesday, saw My Neighbour Totoro at the Gillian Lynne Theatre. A visually imaginative and whimsical stage adaptation, great puppetry and creative direction.
• Wednesday is a change of office day for me. I had a hectic commute, productive meetings, and evening plans cancelled. Dinner included an inventive fridge-clear-out pasta dish.
• Thursday: I worked from home. It was a quiet day. Mum and Dad arrived. It was strange to communicate with people in the office on the day I would usually be there.
• Related, a large vegetable chilli dinner was created.
• Friday to Sunday, family trip to Paris. Travelled by Eurostar and stayed near the Arc de Triomphe. Enjoyed smooth connections, scenic views, and good food throughout.
• Saturday, took in the sights on a hop-on hop-off bus tour, failed to wander along the Seine, and admired the Eiffel Tower at night during a river cruise.
• Celebrated Mother’s Day with lunch on the Bustronome, a double-decker dining experience offering panoramic views of the city as we ate.