Life, Kids, Technology & that move to another continent
M has wanted a new vacuum for a while. There was much debate between a fancy Dyson bag less and a bigger bagged one. I preferred the Dyson. M did not want to clean out another vacuum without a bag. She ended up getting Henry.
It was implied to me that we are now a typical British family for having one. My first thought was now there is another man in the house. That means I am only outnumbered 3 to 2 now!
I am pleased to report my girls continue to love playing with lego. That is the good news. The bad news is they leave it all over the house. Part of our kitchen floor is dedicated for creations. Shelf’s in their room are filled with projects.
Depending on the day the floor of the living room has half built and played with lego creations. With that obstinate course I have to navigate. Ultimately i end up stepping on lego now and again and in some instances break things that were created
It dawned on me the other day after stepping on something that in the narrative of this lego (and my kids) I am Godzilla come to rampage seemingly indiscriminately and then move on. I am ok with that.
What feels like several lifetimes ago I started this blog. In reality it was 18 years ago today. It is so weird to think how much my life has changed in those 18 years. There may have been dry spells where I did not write for a while (a year or so now and again) I have continuously journaled in that 18 years. For someone who used to get claustrophobic in 2 year mobile phone contracts I am impressed that I kept at it.
With a long list of post ideas here is hoping for another 18.
For my birthday I felt a bit nostalgic. I finally will post this entry I wrote almost a year ago. I simply had a lot I wrote and never was sure when to post it. So here I am.
For over a year now (I started writing this post in Jan 2020) I have been thinking about things I am interested in writing about. As much as I like to share, this blog is really for me to just write above all else. That is why I jump around to several different unrelated topics. In thinking about what I write about or want to write about I broke down my writing into a few different categories. Some of them like technology or writing about the girls I’ve been doing for a while. Writing about life as an ex-pat is also not really new anymore either.
There are some distinctly new categories I decided to focus some time on as well. One of which is stories about my dad. The inspiration for that came about around the time he died. In talking about all the funny interesting stories about him he got thinking that I wanted to write some of them down. I have written and posted a few already. There are many more I just haven’t wanted to address however they seem like pretty good stories.
After I started brainstorming about ideas to write about my dad I realized I probably want to write about some things about my childhood and things that happend long ago (aka childhood or single life). The working “category” for those are my origin stories. This particular post was inspired because there’s one story I want to tell. As I started thinking about how to tell it, I realized it is really three separate stories. Each one related and building off the other one. Or that is how it flows for me. As I fleshed those stories out I realised there are more beyond those that I find interesting and would want to tell.
Another category I don’t write a lot about is work. I used to do that often. If you search the archives of this blog you’ll find many work-related posts. There used to be more. However I documented previously how I had to curtail that due to minor issue while working at Parksearch. Nothing bad happened. It was actually pretty funny, even when it happened. I can’t seem to find the right keyword to find that story or else I would share it now. Long story short I originally wrote about work long before it was common and became probilimatic with conflicts of interest. Now I simply do not do it to be safe.
If I orchestrate this properly this intro post will go up right before I start posting some origin stories. Now all I have to do is go write them.
The photo in this post is of a rocket launch pad my dad had at our beach club in the late 1980’s. My dad and rockets will be a post at some point however when looking for a photo that best sums up any origin stories i thought a rocket one was the most appropriate.
The big argument in the Weinstein household tonight centred around frosting. There are those that believe that cake is a delivery mechanism for frosting. Then there are those that believe is not.
No matter how good the cake is it is obvious that all cake is the delivery mechanism for frosting. How in 2021 is this still a thing?
Prior to covering and working from home all the time I was semi-active. If I went to the office the amount of walking between the home, the train, the office and back again (along with lunch or whatever else i did) was close to my exercise and move goals on my Apple Watch. I went to Sainsbury’s something on the way home I would go over my goal with room to spare. That’s not to say I was extremely active. I would force myself to get up and walk around at the office when my watch beeped at me that it was time to stand up. Even then I knew I needed to do more.
Then the lockdown happened in March and I worked from home. Things deteriorated from there. I bought a bike in April hoping that I would use it to ride around. I did for a while however not every day. I have loved riding bikes since I was a kid and I still do. What I keep remembering is when I try it is not something for me that I will do everyday. I am glad I got the bike however it is not my daily exercise.
Over the summer and early fall I cannot recall. I decided that I would go for coffee every day since that would force a walk. I was actually pretty good at doing that for most day is however not all. It would give me a lot of the exercise I needed. It just wasn’t enough. I tried to walk more however I had an issue with walking that i wont go into detail on.
I needed something more and I knew it. My sister and one of my good friends said I should buy a Peleton Bike or Treadmill. When I stopped laughing I realised they were serious. My sister and my brother in law swear by the Peloton. M and my experience with exercise equipment is they take up a lot of space. We had one in our apartment in New York and I don’t know how many times are used it but it was probably less than two dozen in the 4. Years we owned it. We were lucky that the local fire department needed one and they came and took away for us and were happy to do it. Fight story they offered to bring the kids out to the fire truck some of them climb around as a thanks. They showed up with a pickup in the firetruck am at the lights wire on the street and my girls were petrified and did. To go anywhere near it. I thought it was cool though.
Besides the space a bike or treadmill takes up I am not for a $2000 or more so piece of equipment and $35 a month in subscriptions for the service. I never went to a gym other than the one in my building because I didn’t want to pay money for a plan that I would not use.
When Apple announced Apple One and Fitness+ I thought it sounds interesting and moved on to other news. When it launched in early December there were many reviews on some of the tech sites I read. So I read one review. That I read a few more. If the service came out a year before I would have totally ignored it. It is launched at probably the perfect time for me. I need something easy. I needed something with a low barrier to entry. I didn’t want to spend a ridiculous amount of money per month. Fitness+ offered all of that from me. Sidenote nice a low barrier for entry I am talking about me personally. I already an Apple Watch. I already own an Apple TV and iPad. That means I can do the workouts with nothing more than the service. With homepods in the house instead of echoes (i will likely write about that in another post) we switched from spotify to Apple music family plan. With our iCloud plan getting the Apple one bundle with fitness+ was cheaper and i got even more stuff I will write about later.
With my new trial Fitness+ and a yoga mat I borrowed from one of the girls I was doing a work out in the home office or living room. The girls even joined in with me. I have been doing yoga every day of my holiday. I am hoping this is a habit I will adopt. And setting aside 30 minutes a day and I can do the work out literally feet from my desk. The beginner courses are perfect for me. For the first week I did the 10 and 20 minute beginner course. Then I would do a 10 minute wind down that was really a lot of stretching that I needed anyway. I have since moved on to 20 and 30 minute regular yoga classes. with a 5 or 10 minute wind down of stretching. I am now looking at doing a 20 minute and then a 10 minute yoga course in a row to get my 30 minutes of exercise a day. I am finding the 30 minute courses are a little too fast for me. 10 and 20 minute courses seem a bit more geared to beginners or at least slower paced.
M is even getting in on the action. Since i got the Apple One bundle she can use it too. I have been trying to get her to use my Series III Apple Watch I had spare since I upgraded to a series 5. It wasn’t worth selling so I kept it and was just using it at night. She wanted something for when she did bike rides. she never took it then. With me trying this she seemed eager to give it a go. At the moment we were competing in a seven day activity challenge. It is too close to call so I will not trash talk.
I am hoping this is not one of those things that in a few months I will look back and go yeah that was something I did. I am hoping that the habit will take it has such a low barrier to start doing every day.
If you are reading this then first of all thanks. Second that means my switch to my self hosted server is working (for now). I have a post about the what and why. That story is still being edited however I needed to post something to confirm that if I or anyone see’s this post on the site then you are being routed to the new site. if you do not see this, well then you will have no idea that you are pointing to the old site.
I originally started writing this in May or June 2020. I have been pretty slow getting things published.
Even before the Corona Virus lockdown I thought about getting out with the girls on bikes. It wasn’t until last Summer 2019 that both of them were able to bike ride. They could not get very far on their scooters even though they both scooted for years. With biking skills I figured by this summer they would be strong enough bikers that we could at least travel locally around with them. Then the virus happened and we got locked in.
When I commuted to work my walking to and from the train, and walking to and from getting lunch was typically just enough to get my entire activity requirement for the day. At least according to my Apple Watch. When I worked from home prior to lockdown i would need to take a walk to the store or something to get most if not all of my activities requirements. Even before lockdown I figured one way to keep active when working from home would be to get a bike and use it as my daily exercise.
One of my friends at work told me about a bike purchasing scheme the company had so you could get tax relief on a bike if you wanted to bike to work. My luck the scheme closed at the beginning of the tax year on April 1. I was looking to buy something in the middle of April. I had to figure out plan b. I did some research online for a decent all around “hybrid” / street bike. I figured out what brands the local shop sold and found what would work for me online. I then went to the local bike shop on the Saturday before Easter. The bike I wanted was exactly what the guy at the bike shop suggested. I wanted a simple Giant Escape. I was half convinced before going to the shop to get the Giant Escape Disc. It is basically the bike I wanted with slightly more expensive Disk Breaks. The guy at the store told me the same reasons I told myself why I wanted to spend the £50 or so more on the better breaks. More bad timing the bike i wanted in my size was not available in the store. If I had stopped by the day before I would’ve been able to buy it since he had one in stock that he had already sold. Funny enough I did go to the store on Good Friday however it looks like they were closed. I figured since it was Good Friday they were. It turns out he had the shutters down but was open. I was lucky in the sense that he could still order the model and size I wanted online and have it shipped. Apparently several other models and sizes were no longer available since they were having trouble getting shipments from Taiwan.
The bike was supposed to arrive a week later however it took about two before it showed up. It was ready on Friday afternoon so I biked it home to give it a quick test drive. I hadn’t owned a bike in years. The Trek I had when I lived in Manhattan and Long Island city was long stolen from the bike rack in the long-island city apartment.
What could be considered even more bad luck was in mid-May due to the coronavirus lockdown my company announced they were re-opening up the cycle to work purchasing scheme that I originally could not use. Apparently due to the lockdown and concerns about commuting when the lockdown lifted there was lots of inquiries about it. Even though I bought something already I am still tempted to purchase a Bromley folding bike the of the scheme. With a folding bike I could go places with it and then fold it up and take it inside with me where as the bike I have i cannot. The bike I have I would never really lock it up and leave it anywhere. In all honesty I am not sure if I would actually use the folding bike the way i describe. The idea of it does sound very promising though. The other advantage to the folding bike is I could keep it in my home office versus having to keep the regular bike in the shed in the back garden. It’s a minor nuisance have to get it to get through the house and outside. The main reason I want a folding bike is I just want it. I know myself well enough to know that all the other reasons are pretty much rationalizing that. I’m trying to see how much I use what I have before I decide to get something better.
I knew I missed biking. I didn’t realize how much until I actually had one was able to go exploring the neighborhood. That though is maybe another story.
After finishing Revelation Space in late December while I was on holiday I had to sort out what I wanted to read next. I was tempted to read the next book in the Revelation Space series however I reminded myself that I am trying to change pace at least a little bit between books. It took me me a little while to sort out what I wanted to read. I picked Dark Matter from my reading list. It was still science-fiction however a slightly different genre. It was reviewed very well and seemed a like it was perfect for me. A sci-fi book about multi dimensional travel.
Note there will be some possible spoilers of Dark Matter. I had such high hopes for this book. I started seeing sign’s i wouldn’t like it pretty quickly. Early on the protagonists meets a mysterious person was obviously another version of himself.
In another part of the book while he was in an alternate universe it felt like they murdered that version of his wife just to move the plot along. It made no sense or did not feel like they needed to do it other than to put him in a bad situation. I also worried that that twist would turn the book towards a framed murder trope. Thankfully the plot didn’t go that direction however they did use the framing point to a small degree.
Thankfully I was surprised at the direction they took leading up to the climax of the book. I was also slightly surprised at how the book ended. That was good however overall I still feel the book was mediocre. There are just too many sections of the book that I felt annoyed by what was written. It is hard to express however I just was disappointed. I did power through finishing it and I am glad that I did. I still might recommend it since it is a decent mindbending storyline however I wasn’t by any means blown away.
Once I finished Dark Matter I changed genres completely. I read Weapons of Math Destruction. I had heard about this book for a few years now I think. It finally made it onto my to reading list when I saw the author talking in the documentary the Social Dilemma. Sadly Audible UK did not have this book. I wanted to read it enough that I revived my Audible US account and purchased it that way. The author performed the audiobook herself. Her performance was really good. I’d like to say I loved the book however the book is disturbing in what it discusses so saying “love” is probably not appropriate. I thought the stories were fantastic. The issues are extremely thought-provoking. How algorithms are hurting society was disturbing. Overall I highly recommend it. It was well worth the read.
I finished Weapons of Math Destruction in the middle of the month. Due to work commitments I was pretty slow in finishing my next book. I didn’t finish it in February 1. I will put it on my February review list.
Prior to COVID-19 and working from home all the time I was semi-active. If I went to the office the amount of walking between home, the train, the office and back again (along with lunch or whatever else i did) was close to my exercise and move goals on my Apple Watch. If I went to Sainsbury’s or something on the way home I would go over my goal with room to spare. That’s not to say I was extremely active. I would force myself to get up and walk around at the office when my watch beeped every hour telling me that it was time to stand up. Even then I knew I needed to do more.
Then the lockdown happened in March and I worked from home all the time. Things deteriorated from there. I bought a bike in April hoping that I would use it to ride around. I did for a while. It just was not every day. I have loved riding bikes since I was a kid and I still do enjoy it. What I keep remembering is as much as I like bike riding since i do not like riding in every weather condition it is not something I will do everyday. I am glad I got the bike. It is just not what is going to be my daily exercise.
Over the summer and early fall I cannot recall. I decided that I would go for coffee every day. I figured that would force a walk. I was actually pretty good at doing that most day’s. It would give me a lot of the exercise I needed. It just wasn’t enough. I tried to walk more however I had an issue with walking that I wont go into detail on.
I needed something more and I knew it. My sister and one of my good friends said I should buy a Peleton Bike or Treadmill. When I stopped laughing I realised they were serious. My sister and my brother in law swear by their Peleton. M and my experience with exercise equipment is they take up a lot of space. We had an elliptical machine in our apartment in New York. I do not know how many times I used it. It was probably less than two dozen in the 4 Years we owned it. We were lucky that the local fire department needed one and they came and took away for us and were happy to do it. Funny story about that was the Firemen offered to bring the kids out to the fire truck and let of them climb around it as a thanks. They showed up with a pickup for the elliptical and the firetruck with the lights on. The girls were petrified and did not go anywhere near it. I thought it was cool though.
Besides the space a bike or treadmill takes up I am not up for paying nearly £1,750 or more for a piece of equipment and then £35 a month in subscriptions for the service. I never went to a gym other than the one in my building because I didn’t want to pay money for a plan that I would not use. That is a story on its own that I may write about
In September 2020 when Apple announced their Apple One bundles and Fitness+ I thought it sounds interesting and moved on to other news. When it launched in early December there were many reviews on some of the tech sites I read. So I read one review. Then I read a few more. If the service came out a year earlier I would have totally ignored it. It is launched at probably the perfect time for me. I need something easy. I needed something with a low barrier to entry. I didn’t want to spend a ridiculous amount of money per month. Fitness+ offered all of that from me. Sidenote, a low barrier for entry I am talking about me personally. I already had an Apple Watch. I already own an Apple TV and an iPad. That means I can do the workouts with nothing more than the Apple Fitness+ service. With homepods in the house instead of echoes (i will likely write about that in another post) we switched from spotify to Apple music family plan. With our iCloud plan it was cheaper to add the top end Apple One bundle for Fitness+ than just adding Fitness+ for me. By doing this we got Arcade, TV+, News+ and M got to use the services too instead of just me. It seemed well worth the price
I signed up for the Apple One trial. With the new trial account and a yoga mat I borrowed from one of the girls I was doing a work out in the home office or living room. The girls even joined in with me. I did a yoga every day of my holiday. I turned that into doing 30 minutes of work out every day since mid December with the exception (as of this writing) for one day in January.
I am hoping this is a habit I will adopt. And setting aside 30 minutes a day and I can do the work out literally feet from my desk. The beginner courses are perfect for me. For the first week I did the 10 and 20 minute beginner course. Then I would do a 10 minute wind down that was really a lot of stretching that I needed anyway. I have since moved on to 20 and 30 minute regular yoga classes.
M is even getting in on the action. Since i got the Apple One bundle she can use it too. I have been trying to get her to use my Series III Apple Watch. I had spare since I upgraded to a series 5. It wasn’t worth selling so I kept it and was just using it at night. She wanted something for when she did bike rides. She never took it. With me trying Fitness+ she seemed eager to give it a go. At the time of this writing we are competing in a seven day activity challenge. It is too close to call so I will not trash talk.
I am hoping this is not one of those things that in a few months I will look back and go yeah that was something I did. I am hoping that the habit will take it has such a low barrier to start doing every day.