Category: The Week That Was

All Work and No….Well You Know What I Mean TWTW # 57

On By TontowilliamsIn Book Review, books, podcasts, radio, The Week That Was, tv

I’ve tried to write this post several times. Each time I’ve wanted to rant about the General Election. I’ve  just tried to write about it again, but I can’t. I just can’t

So in more positive news, I’ve managed to secure client work, that if I’ve got my timetabling right will take me through to nearly the end of February. One item fell off of the list but was replaced by something else. So work looks like it’s going to be busy. It might mean that these posts also get a bit curtailed over the coming weeks, including this one.

Outside of work I’ve not done a tremendous amount else really. I did manage to read Past Tense by Lee Child over a couple of nights. It’s unusual for me to be able to stay awake long enough to read very much in the evenings, even more so as it just felt like the author was going through the motions. It did cross my mind that there were at least another 100-pages that might have been in an earlier manuscript that got ditched at some point during the editing process, a storyline that never played out. Who knows. It won’t be making my favourite books of the year (if I get around to writing about it this side of Easter 2020).

I’ve been making a conscious effort to try and read some of the books that have been on my shelves for a while, and to not buy too many “new” books. Partly this is to try and create some space but also it seems daft to have so many books sitting there that I haven’t read yet. I don’t mind having lots of books, but it would be nice to think that I’ve actually read some of them!

I’ve been continuing to listen to The Whisperer In Darkness this week. The next three episodes were released on Monday and the reminder are due to be released this Monday (today as far as the posting of this goes). I’ve been really enjoying it. The series writer Julian Simpson, posted a little bit about the research that sits behind the episodes this week which you can read here. You can also find an iTunes link to the episodes in that post, if you haven’t been able to make the BBC website work for you.

I’m also looking forward to some of the radio that’s on over the Christmas period. I picked up a copy of the Christmas Radio Times in the week, and I have to say that there is bugger-all on television over the Christmas period, but the radio section looks pretty good.

Right that’s it for this week. Off to Somerset for client meetings this coming week, but otherwise I’m at my desk, nose down for the remainder.

Big Sunrises TWTW # 56

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was

Hello! The morning light this week has been pretty amazing. I’ve been up early several times and enjoyed the sunrise. It’s also been an exceptionally busy and stressful week. A lot of family things happening with a backdrop of work, client meetings and associated craziness.

I’m glad I went ahead and made a start getting my new laptop set up, and if nothing else I am completely amazed by the battery life. Since I went freelance, I’ve never really had an “office” as such. The closest I get is my desks at home, but I’ll pretty much work wherever I have to. This week in particular I’ve been on the road and working from some unusual places. The laptop battery has kept going throughout, only needing to charge when I did get back home. The manufacturers quoted life is 13 hours and that doesn’t seem to be far off the mark.

The only tech downside this week has been the demise of my old printer. I don’t use one much but I do need one, and I’ve had to replace my old one for a newer model. Essentially the same machine, just with the current spec.

We watched the film Yesterday over the weekend. I think it’s a bit of a marmite film. I really enjoyed it, but Ann hated it. The premise of the film is that after a global power blackout no one except musician Jack Mailk – who had an accident at the exact moment of the blackout – can remember The Beatles or their music. When he realises this Jack uses his knowledge to become the next big thing by releasing the music of The Beatles himself. As I said you’ll probably either love it or hate it, but I think it’s worth a watch.

David Quammen’s blog has been active again with a couple of posts: Sphinx and Loss, Birds & Hope

On my travels this week I’ve mostly been listening to Rendezvous With Rama by Arthur C Clarke. As old and probably classic science fiction it was a great listen, I also have the second book in the series and have just started that.

I’ve also been listening to the first three episodes of The Whisperer in Darkness which I mentioned last week, and it’s got me hooked. Looking forward to the next instalments when they drop later on. The title, some of the characters and storyline are based on the H P Lovecraft short story of the same name, and I’ve been reading that on my kindle, but otherwise my reading has been a bit sporadic this week, I’ve been busy most of the time, and haven’t found the opportunity to really get into another book yet, so short stories are just my thing.

There seem to have been a lot of movie trailers or teasers dropped on the internet this week, here are a few of my favourites:

Because of the way YouTubes algorithms work, it also suggested the upload below, showing various camera angles of the bike stunt in the trailer and the Aston Martin chase scene.

Work this week has been a tale of the present and the future. I’ve been working on current client work this week, and have had a couple of potential projects come forward that would take me through to the end of the year and possibly towards the end of January. At one point I thought that I was going to have more work than I had days in January. It’s nice to be in such demand, I just need to make sure that I deliver against the tasks.

I managed to set a few hours in on the allotment on Saturday, the first time I’ve spent any significant time there for a couple of weeks. The weather and other commitments have kept me away, so it was good to back there. I’ve had a tarpaulin down to keep an area dry so that even in the worst of the rain it doesn’t become too swampy. It’s a simple deal, put the tarp down and leave until ready, then pull the tarp back and dig the space that was covered. Once you’re down move the tarp to the next area to dig and leave for a couple of weeks (if it’s been really wet) and then repeat the process. Next weekend, weather permitting I’ll put some manure down on the area I’ve just dug and then dig the new area the following week. Following that cycle for another month or so and the remainder of the plot will have been dug over and be ready for the new growing season.

I’m planning to do some annual review posts if the time allows; books, films, tv programmes, podcasts etc. I think I’ll either post them separately or possibly do one topic a week for the next couple of weeks (assuming that it doesn’t make this posts any longer than they already are).

There’s a General Election in the week ahead and I’m pretty much working flat out to get things done and play a little bit of catch up on this week just gone. If you’re in the UK then please get out and vote on Thursday, even if you think your vote won’t make a difference, don’t be the person where it does and you didn’t.

Socks of the Cthulhu TWTW # 55

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Film, Garden / Allotment, Kindle, Memories, tech, The Week That Was, tv, work

Greetings from a new computer. I bit the bullet this week and ordered the replacement laptop that will hopefully take me through the next few years of work and life related technology.

I’ve still got lots of setup to do with it and files to transfer but I’m in no hurry, I was planning to do most of that in the break between Christmas and New Year, but I’ve done the basics for now, so if there were to be a failure of my old machine I’d have this one ready to go. It does seem that whatever you buy though the newer machines never come with as much “stuff” as the older versions. Less ports, no CD drive, pushing you ever further away from the analogue and more towards the digital. I’m not sure I like that so much. I like having my music collection on a hard copy format, I still have a lot of CDs, audio cassettes and vinyl. My preferences has been the CD for many years now, and I’m not sure that I want to switch to anything else. It’s the same with books. I like my kindle but I like to have anything I want to keep and treasure as a real book; paper, card and ink that I can touch and feel.

Don’t get me wrong I like the form factor of this new machine, it’s small, light and compact, but in many ways I’d settle for a fountain pen and paper any day.

In addition to the new laptop I’ve also been doing a bit of Christmas shopping, about a 50:50 split between online and physically from the shops. I’ve still a bit to do but it’s early yet, I don’t think I’ve been this far advanced ever before, even though I’m not a last minute shopper at this time of year anyway.

Two greats passed away this week, Clive James and Johnathon Miller both lost to horrible illnesses. “Saturday Night Clive” was a bit of a staple of my teenage years, and the stories of his escapades in homemade go-karts from his “Unreliable Memoirs” still remain in my memory today.

Austin Kleon on healthcare

I’ve not been travelling much this week, so my listening time has been more suited to podcasts and other shorter form audio. Next week sees the launch of The Whisperer in Darkness, which is a follow up to The Mysterious Case of Charles Dexter Ward. These are both titles of stories from H P Lovecraft, but have been retold in a modern setting as radio plays written by Julian Simpson and broadcast on the BBC. You can listen to them here. I’ve been re-listening to The Mysterious Case of Charles Dexter Ward this week as The Whisperer in Darkness launches on December 2nd, so it should be available when you read this. I’ve listened to the trailer for The Whisperer and although you can probably listen to it as a standalone, it might be worth listening to Charles Dexter Ward first.

On the subject of radio, it looks as if Neil Gaiman’s Playing In The Dark which was recorded earlier this year will be broadcast just before Christmas on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4. It’s scheduled for Radio 3 on December 23rd here, and Radio 4 on Christmas Day (although the latter is an edited version). I haven’t seen or heard any previews but the author has written about it on his blog here.

He has also written about the stage production of his book The Ocean At The End of The Lane here, which is also well worth a read if you haven’t already.

I stopped at the library this week with the intention of checking out some books to read, instead I ended up buying some books from their sale stock – books that have been withdrawn from their lending stock. It struck me that actually there was nothing wrong with the books that I bought and that they were very cheap (£1.60 for these four). As soon as the general election is over there is going to be a consultation on the future of our local libraries, and there is much talk about the savings that the council needs to achieve and that libraries are an obvious target for budget reductions. Not much detail is available yet, but we’ll see what the consultation brings when it’s available. I’m hoping that it doesn’t get buried under the seasonal festivities.

Speaking of H P Lovecraft, from a certain angle my Christmas socks seem to have a rather Cthulhu-esque look to them.

I’m on the road a bit more this week, with some trips to Somerset and other places, so until next week, have a good one.

The Last Throes of Autumn TWTW # 44

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Gadgets, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was, tv, work

Welcome to the last week of the meteorological autumn, Winter is but a few days away and it’s a month until Christmas!

It’s beginning to feel like it will never stop raining here. I’ve started monitoring the groundwater levels near my Mum’s house as if they rise too much then there is a possibility of flooding. I don’t think this has happened in the last five years but things were very different for her five years ago and she’d need much more help if it were to happen now. In the meantime I’m doing the anti-rain dance in the hope that might hold things down, or rather keep them in the clouds!

No long trips for me this week but I did finish listening to Edward Snowden’s autobiography, as I only had an hour or so left on the audiobook. It is a proper autobiography and starts in his childhood and goes right through to just past the events that made him infamous. If you don’t know much about the circumstances of his whistleblowing then this gives a good coverage of his side of the story, but ultimately although he is still technically a wanted criminal he did succeed in getting the laws around mass surveillance of US citizens changed.

I’ve started reading one of the “lost” Douglas Adams Doctor Who novels. Shada is a Tom Baker Doctor story with Romana and K-9 as companions. It’s taken me most of the week to read, and I’m about 100 pages to the end, so things are moving towards their climax and the Doctors showdown with the villain. It’s been an enjoyable read, if a little slow to get going, but it’s probably only the sort of book you’ll like if you’re a Doctor Who fan already.

 

Speaking of Doctor Who – this was released in the last week.

Continuing to watch His Dark Materials (and I got the books out of the loft for a read), The War of the Worlds and discovered a TV version of The Name of the Rose showing on the BBC. Not quite sure how we missed the latter as it’s six out of eight episodes in, but fortunately it’s available on i-Player and we blew through the first 3 episodes on Saturday and a couple more on Sunday, so we should catch up to it in real broadcast time soon. (Trailer below if you’re interested).

Workwise this last week has mostly been about ticking things off of my to-do list. There were a few things on there that had been on it for a while in various guises and I wanted to try and push more of them to completion.

I gave a talk on Tuesday evening, another edition of “An Allotment Year”, it seemed to go down well and there were a few questions and people coming up to me afterwards to ask my advice. I normally talk for about an hour and then answer questions until the audience stops asking them. I don’t think I have another one now until mid-January and that one’s a little odd because it’s a mid-afternoon booking whereas they’re almost always evening talks.

I’ve managed to progress client work quite a bit, and followed up on the enquiry about the new piece of work which might start in January.

I’ve been looking at laptops a lot this week, with a view to progressing my plans to replace my existing one in the next few weeks. I’ll be running them in parallel for a bit and doing most of the changeover between the Christmas and New Year period, but I need to do something about migrating a lot of the data between the old machine and the new one. Most of it’s in the cloud anyway, but there’s enough on the actual machine that I’ll still need to do a physical transfer. I’m thinking about a portable hard drive and moving it across that way as it’s probably faster than trying to connect across my Wi-Fi .

That’s about it for this week. I’m mostly repeating last week in terms of commitments and work this coming week, although I do have some travel on Friday, although not too far away. I’ll also be hoping for a drier week if that’s possible. Whatever you’re doing this week, have a good one.

Late For a Very Important Date! TWTW # 43

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Dog, Gadgets, tech, The Week That Was, tv

I’m late this week, despite my best efforts to get these posts out at a consistent time each week, I’ve kind of blown it and it’s not work related but just me losing complete track of time whilst I was doing something else. What was I doing, well I was editing some audio (see below) and getting it uploaded and posted. It’s a binaural recording from our dog walk this morning.

I’ve been wanting to explore this medium for a while. Binaural basically means with both ears, so this is just 360° sound. If you listen to the player below with headphones, you will essentially be listening to what I was. I’d love to know what you think, so if you can stomach 10 mins of me talking (not the whole time), please join us on our dog walk and let me know what you think in the comments below.

Last week was a busy one, lots of different work related things going on and travelling. The week ahead looks like being a little quieter on the travel front, but plenty to keep me occupied otherwise. I’ve had some enquiries for work in the New Year too, which looks promising but isn’t confirmed yet and at the moment it looks like I’m busy right through to that point.

I finished reading Last Bus To Woodstock and listening to The Dog Went Over The Mountain: Travels with Albie, An American Journey. I’ve also read Michael Connelly’s Dark Sacred Night and have been listening to Edward Snowden’s autobiography, Permanent Record in the car on my travels. The latter is interesting, I was inspired to “read” it after listening to his appearance on the Joe Rogen podcast which I posted a link to a couple of weeks ago. This is a proper autobiography and doesn’t just focus on the events that made him infamous. It also perhaps goes someway to explaining why he did what he did and how there has been the reaction to it that there has been (from both sides). It’s worth a listen, and I say that having not yet finished it.

The Final Frontier by Michael Chabon

Cornish homes take part in trial to supply clean power to grid

Never knowingly undersoiled – John Lewis trucks to run on cow manure

 

We’ve been enjoying His Dark Materials on TV, I’ve never read the books but this is shaping up to be a good series, even if I’m still on 100% sure what’s going on, but then I guess that might just be the point. The latest adaptation of War of the Worlds also started last night, I haven’t had a chance to watch all of the first episode yet but it looks promising.

Okay I need to stop typing this now and hit post otherwise it will never happen. Hope you have a great week, and hopefully normal service will be resumed next Monday (or maybe not).

On The Road Again TWTW # 42

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Dog, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was, work

img_0008I’m writing this on Sunday afternoon, as I have a meeting on Monday morning and if I don’t do this now it’s likely that it won’t happen at all. I’ve had a week with quite a bit of travel and I’ve got another week of the same coming up.

Work’s been keeping me pretty busy so I’ve been relishing the other things, like early morning dog walks that take up a smaller part of the day.

img_0005On a return trip from Somerset last week I stopped in the village where I often take a break from the road. The shops were still open and I had a browse in one of the charity shops. I mostly only ever look at the books, and found a complete box-set of Colin Dexter’s, Inspector Morse novels. I’ve read some before but never all of them, and it was probably nearly twenty years ago that I last read one. An opportunity too good to miss I thought.

As I was going to pay I also noticed something else that will make a perfect Christmas present so I got that too. A great break from travelling.

img_0002This week I’ve mostly been reading listening to The Dog Went Over The Mountain: Travels with Albie, An American Journey by Peter Zheutlin. In between chapters of that I’ve been reading the first of the Inspector Morse novels –  Last Bus To Woodstock.

I reckon I’ll finish both this week,but I’m not sure what will be up next. I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the number of books in my “To Be Read” pile and wanting to make some serious inroads into it before I add too many more books to it. It’s been growing a little bit out of control this year. Even though I’ve read a lot of books this year I’ve not made a noticeable dent as the pile has grown at a greater rate.

I did a bit of a “What’s In My Bag” post earlier last week after my Somerset trip.

I’ve started working on the main bed on the allotment, trying to get it dug. It’s quite weedy so I’m going to break it up over several weeks and not rush it so that I get all of the weeds out. Weather depending it should take a few visits but there’s not rush it just needs to be done by Spring.

Well that’s about it for this  week. As I mentioned I’m on the road again a bit this week and working on client project work in between trips.

A Fox In The Darkness At Nighttime TWTW # 41

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Gadgets, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was, tv, Wildlife/Nature

We had our first big Autumn / Winter storm of the weekend. Wet and windy, trees down, power cuts, the whole shebang. For once the weather warning was pretty accurate, which is what they’re for. Otherwise this week has mostly been about the client work. I’ve reached some fairly major milestones with a couple of clients but as it’s been half-term here this last week my clients have mostly been quiet. It’s interesting working in that ecosystem again where school holidays often dictate staff holidays (not unsurprisingly) but not my own.

img_20191029_154754176I had a delivery of some new ink this week. This was a little present to myself for reaching client milestones.

They’re Sky Blue and Prairie Green. I love the green, but I have to say that I’m not sure who’s sky is that blue. It’s much lighter than what I would say is Sky Blue. These are a couple of special edition bottles, and I hope that the green becomes a regular part of their range as I would use it on a regular basis. If not when it’s gone, it’s gone.

 

img_20191029_192943_786

This week I’ve mostly been reading Red Moon by Kim Stanley Robinson. I say reading because I haven’t been much progress, although I did finally finish it late last night. Most of my reading has been around bedtime but sleep has been creeping up on me by the time I’ve read a few pages and so the story is building very slowly.

I am enjoying it though, I wonder whether it is going to be the first book of a trilogy, like his Mars books were (Red, Blue, Green), as the ending doesn’t resolve any of the plot. There is an untitled “Kim Stanley Robinson Book 2” listed on Amazon which you can pre-order for October 2020, so it seems quite possible.

The government has banned fracking. I’m a little surprised by the announcement, as it seemed the government was going to be forever the hypocrite of saying they were doing wonderful things to stop climate change whilst allowing the practice of fracking to take place. It’s interesting though that I haven’t seen any comment on this from the fracking industry itself. I’m sure they’re not happy about it and in all honesty would expect them to sue the government.

How HP Lovecraft became the world’s favourite horror writer

Bread and Books – Seth Godin

Photo’s from the California wildfires

The Bic Biro: Design Classics

Aaron Sorkin: An Open Letter to Mark Zuckerberg – The New York Times

Remember: it’s austerity, not Europe that broke Britain

We’ve been watching Season 2 of Jack Ryan, in fact we watched all 8 episodes over Friday to Sunday evenings. It was good, but not as good as Season 1, although I’m glad it didn’t follow the ISIS / Al-Qaeda trope that so many TV series seem to. Overall probably about 2.5 stars out of 5.

Something has been digging up one of the recently dug and planted (broad beans) beds on the allotment. I’m not sure what it was although I had my suspicions that it might have been the badgers. So I set up the trail cam to see if I could catch the culprit in action. It didn’t actually capture anything in the act, although it did capture a picture of a fox. I’m not sure what happened but I think a combination of the cold and low batteries means that after it captured that one image the camera stopped working. So I might have to try again, once again I get some new batteries.

imag0007

Other than that I’ve been quiet on the plot because of the stormy weather.

img_20191029_160017559The laptop that I’m writing this on, and is my current main business and everything else tool is beginning to show it’s age and I’ve been thinking that I need to upgrade it sooner rather than later. My plan currently is to wait until Black Friday / Cyber Monday in the hope that I might get a little bit of a discount on a new one. Having researched what I need and getting it down to 3 or 4 possibilities. If that happens the plan is to then move files and everything else over during the downtime between Christmas and New Year. In the meantime my current machine took about six hours to do an update last week. Fortunately I’d finished working for the day, and so just left the machine running until it was done (just before I went to bed).

The week ahead sees me on the road again for a client visit and I have a choice of audiobooks for the journey – not sure which I’m going to opt for yet. I also need to work out what “physical” book I’m going to pick up next.

Whatever you’re up to this week have a good one!

Beware! Boats Overhead! TWTW #40

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was

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I’m writing this after coming back from a late Sunday breakfast by the quayside at Emsworth where the local sailing club are lifting out boats for winter storage and maintenance. It’s not everyday that you see a sailing boat flying across the skies albeit helped by a crane. I’ve seen this sort of thing a number of times, and no I’ve never seen them drop one! It was a lovely sunny morning, and for once I had a proper camera – as opposed to a phone camera – with me. Although clearly the last time I was using it, I was shooting black and white.

Outside of that it’s been a really busy week workwise, although I’ve mostly been working at home moving projects forward. I am pleased that I’ve finished one part of a particular project and the results look quite good – if I do say so myself. I’ll be sending them to the client next week. Hopefully they’ll be pleased to as we reach the end of the month and it’s time to send some bills out!

I used to travel on the Eurostar a lot, but haven’t in probably the last five years. I always used to enjoy it, although there were some times when for various reasons there was a problem. I once spent 4 hours stuck in Lille, trying to get to Brussels from London where my outgoing train had been delayed by a lineside fire and I’d had to go from London Waterloo to Ashford in Kent by conventional trains to pick up a Eurostar from there only to find that so was everyone else. This train only made it as far as Lille and everyone who wanted to go to Brussels was turfed off having been told that there would be another Eurostar which would take us onwards and the train we were on was going to Paris instead. There was of course no train to take us onwards and we were all effectively stranded. I made it to Brussels late that evening, fortunately my hotel had kept my room for me, and after my meetings over the next couple of days, my return journey went without a hitch.

Some other people also have some interesting stories to tell.

Warren Ellis and Julian Simpson on how most of the business is in countries other than their home in the UK.

The official opening of Patrick Leigh Fermor’s house.

There’s been a lot of different interviews and videos of Edward Snowden, but this one on the Joe Rogan Experience kind of captured my interest. It’s long – nearly three hours – but worth a listen if you have the time.

This was possibly the most ridiculous thing I read this week (that wasn’t about Brexit or Donald Trump). Not because it isn’t true but because we as a species are completely stupid. To waste so much food (in the form of pumpkins) is something that we should be ashamed of. There is so much you can do with a pumpkin – soup, roast, jam, mash, side veg, chutney, pie, flan – the list is pretty much endless. So take a moment this Halloween and don’t waste that pumpkin you carve.

Fake News is pretty much a daily war-cry but this story is a worry.

The allotment was looking decidedly damp this week due to the rain we’ve had almost every week day. I did manage to take down the runner bean sticks / plants, so that bed is now ready to be dug, but it’ll need to dry out a bit first. A few more days like Sunday should soon see to that, if not I’ll have to get my tarpaulin out and do it that way. No rush though, it won’t be needed until March, but I would like to get it dug and get some manure on it.

Did Donald Trump give two women astronaut “the bird”? Well looks like he has form for it.

One of the Isle of Wight Sea Eagles has died and another is missing.

Europe’s carbon-rich peatlands show ‘widespread’ and ‘concerning’ drying trends

 

Well that’s about it for this week. Over the week ahead I’ve got a few appointments, including getting a flu jab (hopefully to keep me going through the winter), but otherwise I’ll be pushing forward with client work. Hope you have a great week, and as always feel free to say hi in the comments.

 

 

From Inside The Headphones – TWTW #39

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Film, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was

img_20191021_071806748Well as another weekend rolls past and we start another Monday, I’m back at my desk. I wrote this late on Sunday so that I could get a head start on some work for a client first thing on Monday, so by the time you read this I should be well underway with that. I hope this short missive finds you well, and that you find something of interest to you below.

This week I’m mostly working from home, with a couple of trips out to take my Mum for some appointments. One of the benefits of being freelance / working for myself is the flexibility to do things like that, I’d never have been allowed all the time off in my old job.

I’m really noticing the darker mornings, autumn already feels like winter but with the soft-reset of the return to GMT coming next weekend, the light will return to the mornings again, at least for a few weeks.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/stephen-king-bangor-museum-retreat-896011/

I read another Maigret this week; A Man’s Head  by George Simenon. It’s one of the really good ones, although I’m not sure the plot is entirely believable – allow convicted killer to escape from jail to prove his innocence before he is executed.

We watched The Hitman’s Bodyguard on Friday evening (we’d recorded it a week or so ago). We had relatively low expectations of the film but in the end found it laugh out loud funny in places and enjoyed it.

Most of it was completely unbelievable and if you’re offended by swearing you most certainly won’t enjoy it.

Basic premise is that the bodyguard (Ryan Reynolds) has to escort the hitman (Samuel L Jackson) to The Hauge to testify against a war criminal, and all of the war criminals associates are trying to stop them. Trailer below – contains swearing.

We also watched the most recent version of Pet Sematary [sic], well we watched the first 45 mins or so, and then lost interest and turned it off. I’m disappointed because I’d heard that this one was much better than the one that was made in the early 1990’s. Still some you win and some you don’t.

The weather has been pretty wet all week, but brightened up on Saturday to enable me to get onto the allotment. I’ve dug over the bed for the broad beans and sown them, so with luck they’ll over winter and we’ll have another good crop in late May next year. This just leaves me the main bed to dig over the coming months, but this is probably the biggest job due to the amount of creeping buttercup that is present. I’ll be doing a little bit at a time so that it doesn’t become an overwhelming prospect.

Podcasts: I mentioned last week that I’ve been listening to a lot of podcasts recently. This is in part due to travelling more for work than I have for a while, and not wanting to listen to the 24hr Brexit news coverage that seems to have become just about every broadcast radio and tv station. That’s not to say I’m not following what’s going on, I just wanted to consume it at a sane dose and not be bombarded by it every thirty seconds. So between audiobooks and podcasts this has become my go to entertainment when travelling.

So here’s a list of podcasts that I listen to most regularly. By that I mean I’ll listen to most episodes as they are released. There are a few others, that I don’t listen to as faithfully but for brevity I’ve not included those. Links are for homepages or feeds, I’ll leave it to you as to how you listen to them.

Deep State Radio. A US current and foreign affairs podcast. Good for keeping up with just what the hell is going on in the White House and wider government. Posts several times a week with the main episodes being on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

SW945: A Walk in Japan. A binaural podcast of background noise from whereever the author is at 09:45 each morning (when walking). Best listened to with headphones. [On a hiatus at the moment, as the author isn’t walking, but there are nearly 40 episodes to catch up on].

Floating – Swimming Stories with Joe Minihane. From the author of the book with the same name, interviews and discussions with swimmers and others.

On Margins. By the same author as SW945, a podcast on writing, publishing and related topics.

The Tim Ferriss Show. Fairly well known podcast from Tim Ferriss, author of several books, entrepreneur and experimenter. Interviews with many well known and some less well know people.

The Kevin Rose Show. Fairly similar in content to Tim Ferriss above (and there are occasional overlap episodes).

The Drive. A podcast from doctor Peter Attia about all things medical and medical science.

As I said these are my main goto podcasts but there are a few others that I dip into occasionally. Mostly if they have a guest that I think I’ll like or topic that is relevant.

If you have any suggestions or recommendations for me based on the above or want to give a shout-out to your favourite show, then leave me a comment below.

A summation of the current Brexit fiasco from Charles Stross

I read Pico Iyer’s – Autumn Light  back in April, here’s a good summary of the book, with some extrapolation of some of the ideas it contains from the Brain Pickings website.

I think that’s it for this week, as always, be careful out there.

Rinse and Repeat TWTW #38

On By TontowilliamsIn books, Garden / Allotment, The Week That Was, work

img_20191003_072036752_hdr-effectsAutumn seems to have arrived, damp and much cooler.

I must admit to feeling a little frazzled, it’s been a busy couple of weeks, and although I missed writing here on my usual weekly post, I’m glad I gave myself the break.

My routine has been: Wake Up>Make & Eat Breakfast>Walk Dogs>Work>Make & Eat Lunch>Walk Dogs>Work>Make & Eat Dinner>Travel To Evening Talk>Give Evening Talk>Drive Home>Sleep>Repeat as required.

This has included quite a bit of travelling for other work commitments as well as to give evening talks, and I’ve got through a fair bit of audio books and podcasts when I’ve been on a train or in the car, more on that below.

It also feels good that my days have returned to a bit more normality (at least for the time being), I have no more evening talks until the middle of November and then after that nothing until January, so I can focus on the day-job!

I’m really looking forward to the new Star Trek series, and this new trailer dropped as part of the New York Comic-Con.

And while thinking about this, the series writer is Michael Chabon, and this is an interesting discussion about some of his other works and how they have influenced the Star Trek  cannon.

I’ve only had a little time for the allotment in the past couple of weeks. The weather hasn’t always been favourable, but I have managed to do some of the end of season digging and put some manure out on the plot to feed the soil for next season. With autumn arriving it’s going to be more of the same over the coming weeks.

screenshot_20191010-145052I’ve finished a couple of audiobooks while I’ve been travelling. Darwin Comes To Town by Menno Schilthuizen and A Jaguar Ripped My Flesh by Tim Cahill.

I  also finished The Robots of Dawn by Isaac Asimov.

All were great and I enjoyed them all. I’d forgotten that the Asimov was as much a crime fiction as a science fiction, and it’s made me want to track down the previous two books (The Caves of Steel & The Naked Sun) in that series because I don’t remember those either. At the moment though my to be read pile as rather large and I think I need to work on reducing it a bit before I buy more books, plus I’ve got some pre-orders arriving over the next few weeks. I will keep an eye out for them in the secondhand stores thought and if I don’t find them before I’m ready, I’ll be using the library.

In between audiobooks, I’ve also had my earbuds in listening to a lot of podcasts. I think I’ll save the list of the things I’ve been listening to for another time, as this post is probably going to be quite long as it is, but I particularly enjoyed listening to a recent edition of the Tim Ferriss podcast on one of my journeys. It features Neil deGrasse Tyson, and prompted me to track down a couple of his books.

img_20191011_103919_190

One of those books I ordered secondhand and it came in the post on Friday – Death By Black Hole – when I opened it up there were lots of bookmarks still in the book. It had obviously been someone’s (there was a ticket stub with the person’s name and address on) airport / in-flight read at some point in 2008. This person had, in October that year flown from Luxor to Cairo and then later the same day on from Cairo to Sharm El Sheik. He’d had a pizza and a margarita on his stop over in Cairo. Three weeks later he flew from Heathrow to Denver at which time I think he must have finished the book because that is where the forensic trail runs cold.

I’ve had a couple of secondhand books like this recently that people have left “bookmarks” in and it’s always interesting to see what you can decipher from them.

The Problem With Net-Zero Emissions Targets [LINK]. I’m involved in a couple of projects looking at this at the moment, so this was an interesting read for me.

And at the other end of the spectrum, the 20 firms behind a third of global carbon emissions [LINK].

North Atlantic Right Whales Are Dying in Horrific Ways[LINK].

If you can access BBC Sounds or iPlayer – I’m not sure whether this works outside of the UK or you can use a VPN to access – then BBC 6 Music are doing a series of the favourite music of graphic content writers. They’ve already had Alan Moore, and Neil Gaiman on. Hannah Berry and Warren Ellis are up in the next couple of weeks.

Jonathan Franzen: online rage is stopping us tackling the climate crisis [LINK].

img_20191002_142921461The last few years I’ve wanted to give a Hobonichi diary a go. I journal most days and I hope that this will be something a little different.

I know it’s only October but these sell pretty quickly, and in previous years I’ve left it too late to get one, so I’ve ordered early.

Bit of time before I get my hands on it properly, but I’ve already got quite a few dates for things in 2020.