Updated 18th October 2022 from Nontron, France
- Home: Still shuffling around beds – took bunk bed apart and put back together in the Sous-Sol – same for a grey storage bed. I managed to go through two of the bunk bed steps when kneeling on it – much bruising! So opportunity to put together the table saw and make a few new steps with a lot of reinforcement!!! Freezing last of the season’s apples and enjoying the autumn crocuses blooming. Local organic food basket shifting with the season as expected – got a turnip last week! Still only 15 Euros. Total bargain, and we’re using seasonal vegetables we’ve never considered using before – Chard seems to be a staple these days! New breadmaker makes respectable sourdough, so that’s made things a lot easier. Oh, and I realized shortbread is just like making compacted crumble, and is too delicious. I put on a kilo in the last few weeks. Pat’s been getting some help from Carol in working through the immense roomful of bedding upstairs (an accumulation from many moves over many years) which is honestly a real relief. And we sold a bed – they’ll be coming for a mattress too – decluttering through recycling gives a better feeling than trips to the déchetterie (rubbish tip).
- Work: Well the RFP from a local council wasn’t viable, and I’ve been told my employment in France won’t be renewed. I’m asking about whether moving back to the UK is viable – waiting to hear back. Only a few weeks before the employment contract ends. I’m being realistic, and looking around the contract market for alternative work.
- Fiction: Editing first vampire book – doing a little every day now, and that’s working out well. Also writing some poetry – I’m using OpenAI’s Dall-e 2 AI to generate images that I’m using for writing prompts on a theme of Hallowe’en – fun distraction! Created a very basic web site to keep these in one place, and planning to do one-a-day.
- Non-Fiction: Outlined a book about how we create a narrative of the world and what this means. I brainstormed, and the ideas and connections kept coming, so I think this may have legs – but I think will take some time to research and formulate into something coherent.
- Open Source: This is all on pause right now while I work out what’s next. Markdown Settings npm library needs a new release soon because I’ve found various flaws in the way it works, and I also need a way of writing back the settings – which because of the way I’ve implemented it means it needs some hints to work
- Closed Source: Working out an initial target niche for Trello-based personal management tool, and a plan for action when I start working on it. It is ideas at the moment, but I’ve got an idea of how to implement it now, and the order of work. I’ve been using a manual system for over a year now of working with Trello, so I understand where the obvious places are for automation that would make this easier for myself!
- Personal: Discovered Plex (for Movies, TV shows and Music), so moving all my CDs and DVDs onto this for me to use from my computer, phone or Smart TV. I like this half-way between only buying what you want to watch, but still having a physical asset as a back-up. It isn’t perfect by a long way, and it seems to be moving towards monetization through streaming TV channels, so we’ll see how this plays out in the long run. Exercise / Meditation routines are pretty much the same – I’m finding myself doing more DIY work which keeps me moving a fair amount. Bits of occasional charity work for CSF, and book club fiction (Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh) and non-fiction (Your Music and People by Derek Sivers – have read but watch the excellent animated video version of this for a few minutes at a time when I feel like it on Plex). I think of Derek’s book as the missing (business) part of the The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. Also started Bernoulli’s Fallacy, but the first part has been a bit of a struggle to stick with.
- Web Site: Created a new site called Dali Poetry mentioned earlier – first poem is Death Bread Car. Silly, but enjoyable to do. Updated the me page on this site.