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Several years ago, I had the opportunity to work at a federal government agency. There was a lot to like about the experience, but one negative was the time it took to provision a virtual machine for us to run our code. The record for longest wait was about a year. #mbnov
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Sunset over the suburbs, taken 2 weeks ago. You can get some pretty nice sunsets around this time of year. It’s a shame my camera and photo-taking skills are not good enough to capture how nice the light was that evening. #mbnov
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During the second coronavirus wave in Melbourne, a “ring of steel” was imposed, encircling the metropolitan in an attempt to contain the outbreak. That border dropped a few weeks ago, and today we crossed it for the first time since June. #mbnov
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One feature of living in the Southern Hemisphere is that you get to see winter decorations in shopping centres twice a year. First when it’s actually winter, and the second around this time of year, with the lead up to Christmas. #mbnov
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It’s getting harder to go on lunchtime walks without having to slap on sunscreen or a hat. I may need to move to evening walks, when the intensity of the sunlight starts to fade. #mbnov (Today’s was a tricky one).
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After dealing with Apple Developer Certificates and Provisioning Profiles for a single app for work, I feel for all the macOS and iOS developers out there that need to deal with this on a regular basis.
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I don’t know if it’s just me, but I find all these online services that push you these A.I. driven “recommendations” of things to follow, watch, read, etc. really distasteful. I wish it was possible to turn some of these off. #mbnov
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Why I'm Considering Building A Blogging CMS
I’m planning to start a new blog about Go development and one of the things that I’m currently torn on is how to host it. The choice look to be either using a service like blot.im or micro.blog or some other hosting service, using a static site generation tool like Hugo, or building my own CMS for it. I know that one of the things people tell you about blogging is that building your CMS is not worth your time: I myself even described it as “second cardinal sin of programming” on my first post to micro.blog.
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I have to keep reminding myself, when I’m building personal software projects, the costs of adding dependence to external modules. It’s one of those balances that I struggle with, along with the perennial one of building something vs. using something off the shelf. #mbnov
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There are people out there who love cars, boats and planes; but chalk me up as one who loves a good train. #mbnov
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Occasionally, when I go to the ABC News site, it stirs up the memory of the mid 90’s ad campaign for the site. Being the early days of the web, I remember distinctly the announcer saying out loud each letter in the URL. I think it was the first URL that I ever saw. #mbnov
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It’s meant to be a warm, windy, 33°C day today, a perfect day for washing sheets. What I’m currently seeing now is a far cry from that: dark skies and smattering of rain on the roof, with more on the way according to the radar. Why?! #mbnov
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Today’s Microblogvember word is spooky. This is not something that I handle well. For example, I don’t like spooky movies. I think the last one I watch was 20 years ago, and it had an effect on me for a few months. #mbnov
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I’ve switched from a Lenovo laptop back to a MacBook Pro for work, which means I no longer need this smart plug setup for extinguishing the charging LED at night. It’s not used for anything at the moment, but I guess it’s still useful. Maybe for the Christmas tree lights. #mbnov
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I was asked to come into the office for the first time since the start of the pandemic. It felt strange to wear a shirt again, something that I haven’t done since March. It also means that I’ll need to relearn how to iron it. #mbnov
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While I did say that I might have gone Chromebook over iPad two days ago, I must also say that the new Macs with Apple Silicon look really exciting and I look forward to hearing about how well they perform. #mbnov
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We’ve had zero new Covid-19 cases for several days now so I took a risked and visited my elderly grandmother. We were both very careful, we both wore masks during the visit, and were maintaining 2 metres of distance. But it was good to see her again. #mbnov
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The ads from Google are getting worse. I continue seeing an obviously fake one offering me advice on how to get rich (the claims of being an Aussie while using the NZ flag is a giveaway). If I keep seeing this, it will force me to setup Pi-hole. #mbnov
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An anecdote regarding the removal of iSH from the App Store
Around April this year, my old Android Nexus 9 tablet was becoming unusable due to it’s age and I was considering which tablet to move to next. I have been a user of Android tablets since the Nexus 7 and I have been quite happy with them (yes, we do exist). However, it was becoming clear that Google’s was no longer interested in maintaining first-party support for Android on a tablet, and none of the other brands that were available were very inspiring.
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If there’s something that I’ll take away from the events of this year, it’s that adversity can, in some circumstances, bind us closer together. #mbnov
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I think my recent pattern of constantly refreshing web-pages is going to inflate my internet bill, as I seek news updates on the Coronavirus and the US elections. #mbnov
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It’s puzzling but I’ve been finding myself having lunch earlier in the day than usual. I think it’s because I’ve joined a company that has their head office in Perth, which is 3 hours behind me at the moment, and the mornings are really quiet now. #mbnov
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It’s cold and wet today. The steps leading to my front door, which I think is called a stoop in the US, can be pretty slippery on days like this, so I’ll have to be a bit careful. #mbnov
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Passed by a kangaroo during my evening walk a couple of days ago. I was surprised by how unphased he seemed to be by my presence, given how near I was to him. #mbnov
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Tracking Down a Lost Album
Here’s a short story about my endeavours to find an album that seems to have disappeared from the face of the internet. I’m a bit of a sucker for original sound tracks, particularly instrumental ones. One that I remember being very good is the music from The Private Life of Plants, a documentary series from David Attenborough made in the mid 1990s. It was one of those sound tracks that occasionally popped into my mind, particularly when looking at lovely autumn leaves or other scenes from the show. But it has been a while since I last watched it, and I never though to look at whether an album of the sound track actually existed.
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