scott

Coffee With Cortana

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I did not goto the office from March 2020 through August 2021. Since August i have mainly worked from home with periodic days in the office. I’ve said it before that my walking to and from the train on my commute was the bulk of my exercise.I was lucky in the sense that walk give me about 80% of my daily activity and step count needed for at least a basic level of movement. While at the office I would deliberately walk further when doing things to get more movement in throughout the day.

I’ve written about some of my exercise routine during the lockdown so I won’t rehash most of it. Since April 2021 and the restrictions on lockdown easing I have been trying to get out more and more for coffee. It is one way I try to offset the lack of my commute and the exercise that comes with it.

I had been typically meeting up with friends in the morning for coffee. The way my schedule works is early morning is really the only consistent time I could get away. The challenge was catching up after taking a 30 minute break or getting peoples availability on a consistent basis.

On a separate thread that becomes related later I’ve been playing around with Microsoft outlook on my iPhone. For several months now Microsoft has had an option that it will read you your mail and allow you to audibly take actions on it. at first it was a novelty. Then they kept adding features and I figured out a workflow that was useful for me. I found that if I had a lot of messages I could listen to them and flag the ones that I wanted to look at in more detail or respond to, or take any action on later. Things that weren’t important or I didn’t need to do anything with I could simply archive. I also could except or decline meeting invites. In essence I wasn’t able to completely control my inbox using Cortana reading to me however I can organize it in such a way that when I sat at my desk I could focus on specific things to do.

One day when no one was around to have coffee I figured why don’t I just go anyway since it was a lovely day. before that point I was not really using the Cortana read to me functions that much so it did not dawn on me to just go to coffee and sit and listen to my mail. On one faithful day in June that’s just what I did.

Once the males done being read to me I typically have a list of flagged mail that I need to either file away or take actions on. usually I break out my iPad and write responses to things. Anything that requires further research or dedicated time on a bigger display I’ve created to do task from that. From there I generally have a good feel for what immediate work I need to do today beyond my longer-term project and task list.

The coffee shop I have been going to is near my house and after the school drop off appears pretty empty most of the time. The staff is always super lovely and I can sit out in the back garden when it’s not cold or raining. Actually I think they even have heaters when it’s cold however I’ve only done that once or twice. i’m pretty pleased with my routine and hope to continue doing it weather permitting.

I originally wrote this article over the summer of 2021. Sadly the coffee shop i wrote about is gone. Now a days I go to other ones and generlaly am using Cortana more on my walk to and from the school runs with the kids.

W Sisters Short on Drawing a Laptop

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The other day T showed me something she drew. That happens often since she likes to draw and is pretty creative. What she showed me was a paper laptop. I’ve seen her earlier in the day doing what one would describe as pretend typing on it. At the time I did not fully register what she was doing.

Once she showed me the “laptop” it became much clearer. Her laptop had a keyboard, trackpad and screen full of applications. I could tell she had her search engine as well as a teams chat with several of her friends on video. For a minute I thought my use of technology was rubbing off on her. Then I realised it’s what she does with her class. She mentioned Google search specifically at school the other day. After that I had to explain why we don’t use Google at home. Doring lockdown she did video teams calls with her class. It all made sense and was exceedingly adorable. The fact that she still plays pretend with it makes me smile.

Having Tea 36 Floors Up

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During our last minute staycation/local holiday in October I needed to find things to do with the girls. With the help of the American Express Concierge I was able to get last minute reservations for Hight Tea at Ting in the Shard. I wanted something nice, yet obviously kid friendly. Everything I tried to find was booked. That is what I get for trying to plan a holiday during half term on the Monday of the break. I really had no option on doing that so I needed some help. I thought to try American Express and they gave us two options. It was Ting, or a place we had gone to already when my mum was visiting. Since Ting was on the list of top kid friendly tea lists I had seen I was eager to try it.

As High Tea’s go it was OK. The girls liked the iced tea starter that they make smoke with dry ice. The sandwiches and scones were good. Things broke down at desert. Ting had a special “pink” themed tea. The girls were intrigued and excited until desert arrived. It was all pink. That meant lots of strawberry and other pinkish jam based deserts. One of the girls liked some of it and the other did not like much. I was not interested in any of it.

The view was spectacular. We got a seat right at the window. Would I do Tea again here? Maybe. Curious on if a regular Tea would be better than the themed one. The view alone give it decent rating. Overall I would say Tea was above average.

Our 4th England-versary

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Luggage Cart Full of Luggage

It does not really feel like a long time until you really start to think about it. Then it does start feeling like a long time. It is so misleading thinking 4 years is not a lot if you are in your 40’s. Looking at the photos of us getting ready to move and I realise how little the girls were compared to now. The cliche is true. So much has changed and yet so much is the same.

4 years ago we were scared and excited. We had so much to do. So much to explore even beyond the physically just getting here. Today there is still so much to explore. We are still excited to be living here. So much so that this year we bought the house we were renting. M called it perfectly 4 years ago when we were looking at houses on our Thanksgiving week scouting trip in 2017. Of the 12-15 we looked at she flagged what became ours as the one she was most interested in. In the end it was down to this house and one other. The location and school options on our house won out. It is why we initially inquired with the former owners to purchase it right around a year ago near our 3rd anniversary here. We were delighted they were interested in selling. We looked around our neighbourhood for other options earlier this year. There were a few possibilities however when it became clear we could have the house we were in we knew our choice.

Lockdown’s and pandemic’s have slowed our exploring. Just not our desire to continue to explore this new country and continent. We are still excited for 4 more and many more years to come…

A small story about the luggage cart pictured that can almost summarize a big difference between NY & London.

Those carts in JFK are like $5 a piece to rent. They are for going from the car drop off to the check in counter. A trip that is maybe 2 minutes.

At Gatwick or Heathrow (in this story we arrived in Gatwick) the same carts are free. On top of that there are little kid carts throughout arrivals for one or even two kids for you to put your kids in for the very long walk to customs. Once you get through customs to get your luggage you can get a free cart for the much longer walk than in JFK for your luggage.

And Then You Blink and Now Have an Eight Year Old

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I keep saying it. It keeps happening. I wake up and the girls are so much bigger. They are still adorable little kids. I just now the days of saying that are slowing running out. I attempt to savor each day when they are so cuddly. Today A turns 8.

Due to situations beyond our control we stayed in for the day. M organized a take away Tea setup for lunch. As well as fancy bagels and cake for dinner. Hopefully we can have a semi normal party for A after the term break is over. Only government restrictions and COVID will tell.

$8.89 Web Hosting

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Last year when the promotional deal I had for three years of Web hosting was running out I purchased a VPS costing about $24.00 for the year. A VPS, aka Virtual Private Server is a Virtual Machine at a hosting provider that is setup just for you/me. It is a nice playground to let me install use the compute power however I want it. The deal I bought I thought was great. To renew via the traditional hosting plan I had at the time would have run me like £15 a month. I wrote about the crazy costs of web hosting when i purchased the VPS (Virtual private Server) aka a Virtual Machine dedicated for my use at a hosting provider.

I have had really good luck with the VPS and the provider. I even purchased a 2nd more powerful VPS when they had a New Years sale. I use each VPS for different purposes however the one I used for hosting I have used all year. The only slight downside is that its my responsibility to manage and maintain. In a big deal however it is in the back of my head what happens if I have a catastrophic failure. I do have back ups it would be awesome effort to get the system restored. Thanksgiving started rolling around I kept my eye out for new deals for hosting. When Black Friday came around the same provider that offered the VPS deal had a deal for what they call CPANEL hosting for $8.89 a year. Basically that means they were offering a managed hosting package for less money a year than many plans offer for a month. There were some small limitations on the number of domain’s i could link to the account. For a few dollars more i could increase the offering. For my needs the $8.89 plan was just fine. I “splurged” and bought 2 years for less than $18.00.

One thing I like about this provider is when they offer a deal it’s not an introductory one. Meaning I just renewed VPS purchase last year and I feel exactly the same amount for the renewal. This is a refreshing change from pretty much all other mainstream Web hosting providers at the deal the offer is only good the first time you buy it.

Over the past few weeks I’ve been testing out there setup. It has been pretty stable. Anything I have wanted to do i have been able to. Building that confidence today I migrated my mail and blog over to the new hosting. The VPS i have is not going away. I renewed that already for the next year. I will continue to use it for some other apps i host and a few other things however i will entrust my blog to the hosting provider instead of running on my own VM.

And no I cannot tell the difference between the £100+ per year hosting vs the $8.98 a year one. That is what amuses me.

Now lets hope that after writing how things look stable they do not blow up in my face tomorrow.