Recursive Words

The darkest timeline

April 25, 2026

The weekend has finally arrived. Rather than escape to Wetherspoons this morning I wandered to the corner shop, picked up some bacon, and made bacons sandwiches for myself and my middle daughter for breakfast.

She somehow scraped herself out of bed at 8am after returning home from work only a few hours earlier. She often works Friday and Saturday nights because she’s experienced, industrious, and fast – probably the most valuable attributes a bar worker can have.

Following the “elephant in the room” that’s covered my writing with its shadow for the last couple of weeks, I’ve been busy installing a surveillance operation both around and inside our house, and letting our neighbours know about it. We’re covering major routes around and within the house with ring cameras that pipe their footage directly to the internet, should it ever be needed. We’re also installing solar powered lights that will illuminate the alleyway between our house and next door (that leads to our garden) – something we should have done years ago really.

The lives of everyone in the house has been in a strange sort of limbo for the last few weeks. I’ll likely never share the full story online – both because it’s not my story to tell, and I don’t want to give anybody any ammunition to involve me directly in any of it. My job as a parent is to protect, and to support – not to seek retribution, revenge, or anything else.

Deep breaths.

You know how you always try to see the best in people though? And then something happens that makes you wonder if that’s actually a failing on your part? That you should be more cynical about letting people earn your trust? That.

Anyway. IT’S THE WEEKEND!

Let’s try not to dwell too much – even while we’re in the middle of apparently the darkest timeline.

Who used to watch “Community”? If you’re unaware of the “darkest timeline” reference, I implore you to find it, and watch it. Best TV show in decades. Without ruining it too much, one of the later episodes hinges around a specific point in the story – that branches into multiple “sliding doors” – exploring many of the “what ifs” that could diverge from the most innocuous of events.

I’m listening to BBC Radio 2 while writing. Rylan is about to take over from Emma for an afternoon of idiocy. Looking forward to it. She’s been playing some amazing tunes over the last couple of hours.

Has anybody else noticed more country music on the radio recently? Or is it just me noticing it because I’ve been listening to a lot of Kacey Musgraves, Ella Langley, and Kelsea Ballerina? Perhaps while the radio is playing, your subconscious only picks out tunes you know well? I’ve never really thought about it before.

Hey look at me, anyway – I’m writing a blog post! Go me!
Relentless

April 21, 2026

I woke with a start a little after 6am this morning before waking again a few minutes later. Finally scraping myself out of bed perhaps half an hour later, I wandered downstairs and stood in the shower staring at the wall – wondering how many things we do like automatons every day.

After clearing the kitchen, emptying the dishwasher, putting the bins out, and not even thinking about tidying up the hell the lounge has become, I’m now watching the clock tick down to the start of another working day.

The elephant I vaguely referenced recently – that cast a shadow over the entire weekend – is still here. Still not dealt with. It’s mentally exhausting.

The sun is shining outside.

The hedge at the front of the house is growing. I’ll need to cut that soon. The grass in the garden is growing. I’ll need to cut that too.

Everything feels like “something I’ll need to do” at the moment. Something else on top of everything else.

It’s relentless.

I wonder how much of our lives we spend meeting the expectations of others – either known, or unknown? Making ourselves presentable. Making our homes presentable. Making things we do presentable. Why does everything have to be so performative? Who are we actually doing everything for? For ourselves, or for others? And why?

Work starts in half an hour.

A cup of coffee. That’s what I’ll do. I’ll go and make a cup of coffee. The world always feels a bit better when accompanied by a cup of coffee.

And maybe message a friend – away from the chaos – and just say good morning. No performance. No expectation. Just good morning. Sometimes it’s enough to know that somebody thought of you. I think so, anyway.
Maybe this IS a simulation

April 18, 2026

2026-04-18 Maybe this IS a simulation

Why is it that just as you start to think you’re getting on top of things, and reluctantly begin to think the world isn’t quite so bad after all, the world will find a way to shit on you from a colossal height.

I can’t really tell you what’s going on, because it’s not my story to tell.

Still though… (shakes fist at the universe)

I’m sitting in the junk room, listening to some no-name playlist on the computer. The rest of the household are in bed – apart from my middle daughter who is working through to close at Wetherspoons.

There’s SO little to report at the moment (well… apart from the elephant in the room, vaguely referred to at the start). My entire life seems to revolve around work, washing up, or content creation for YouTube.

I sometimes wonder if my purpose – if there is any purpose to our existence – is to pick up, fix, and put back together. Not just houses, or computers – people too. I seem to spend most of my time trying to put my kids back together, or help them through whatever has most recently befallen them (there always seems to be something).

Not only am I the “Bank of Dad”, I am also my children’s best friend, their mortal enemy, in their way, or not helping enough.

I wish life came with an instruction book. After playing it for however many years I’ve managed to so far, all I seem to have learned is that winning isn’t in the deck of cards. The best you seem to be able to hope for is to get to the next move more or less unscathed.

When the children were little they regularly played a board game called “The Game of Life” – where you would advance around a board on dice rolls and gain a husband or wife, children, a house, premium bonds, savings, and so on – and hopefully reach the end having done remarkably well for yourself.

Can you imagine the real-world version of it? Where you just hope to get to the end. That’s it. You just hope to move at least one square forward each time, but somehow never leave the middle of the board. As soon as you think you’re making progress, the board will expose its rigged nature and set you back for daring to hope.

Perhaps that’s it. Perhaps I’ve unwittingly discovered that this IS a simulation – and it’s rigged to keep up from progressing. Just as Truman lived in an enclosed seaside town, maybe the simulation we all share has bounds that present as misfortune.
One foot in front of the other

April 14, 2026

2026-04-14 One foot in front of the other

Today was a better day – I think mostly because I forced it to be. It’s funny how much difference a good night’s sleep can make. I woke with a start at perhaps 6:30am, had a shower and a coffee, and it was still not 7am.

While brushing my teeth I smiled at myself in the bathroom mirror – remembering my Grandfather’s insistence that the early morning hours were the best part of the day.

This evening, while my youngest daughter headed to Wembley Stadium to watch the Lionesses play Spain in a World Cup qualifier, I helped babysit the youngest member of our household – now three months old.

Almost every day brings a new behaviour now – a new aspect to her rapidly forming personality. In the early days and weeks it was all about eye tracking, hearing, and touch – now emotions are starting to make an appearance. Having not seen her throughout the day, my face appearing in her field of view conjures a broad smile. Tonight’s trick was turning her head to gaze rapidly around the room while feeding from her bottle – making the task of keeping the bottle anywhere near her mouth something of a gymnastics act.

I can only guess we are beginning to enter the “sponge” stage of her development – where all systems are coming on line to begin interpreting, processing, and absorbing everything around her.

It’s amazing really, isn’t it – the first few months in a baby’s life – where their brain boot-straps from the most basic of commands; to breath, eat, and sleep – and rapidly begins re-programming itself from the inside out for sensory input, recognition, and emotion.

Most of you know I work as a software developer. The company I work for is out on the bleeding edge of machine learning – both exploring applications for it, and trying to understand it. In many ways the “Artificial Intelligence” that people talk about is still at the stage of a gifted toddler – it has learned to read, to talk, and to reason – but knows little of the world.

There is a wonderful scene in the movie “AI” where William Hurt asks an android woman “what is love” – and without pause she begins describing the minute physical manifestations of attraction. There’s also the scene in Good Will Hunting where Robin Williams character confronts his young charge with the realisation that he can’t tell him what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel.

Anyway.

Late this evening I found myself alone in the lounge watching the movie “Jobs” – starring Ashton Kutcher as the title character. Quite unexpectedly at the end of the movie I found a tear falling down my cheek as the famous “crazy ones” speech was recounted.

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

And here I am – sitting in the dark, tapping away on the keyboard of an Apple Mac – the legacy of a man who was by turns brilliant, monstrous, egotistical, obsessed, fanatical, or a colossal prick – depending on who’s stories you read.

He was right though. Thinking you can change things does require at least a little craziness. Then presented with an idea, some only see obstacles – whereas others see the destination, or beyond.

I’ve never been particularly visionary. I’ll happily concede to being a “plodder” – making quiet progress forwards, and hoping to get from today to tomorrow without too much fuss.

The wonderful thing about only concentrating on the next step is that you don’t notice how much chaos or mayhem surrounds you – you just keep making the next step, and the next until you somehow arrive at a destination.
Poetry and Washing Up

April 13, 2026

I appear to have fallen off the internet bicycle again – and it’s not so much that I’m struggling to get back on it – it’s more that I’m not sure I really want to.

I’m willing to consider that I’m ever so slightly burned out.

After the last couple of years working flat out in the daytime on corporate projects, and then flat out in the evenings and on weekends on content creation for the YouTube channel, there hasn’t been much of me left.

Escapes I used to cherish such as running, reading books, writing in the blog, and catching up with friends have become afterthoughts. You don’t need to tell me how bad that is.

I can’t remember the last time I sat down at the end of the working day to just watch television. There’s always something to do – something to research – something to record – something, something, something.

I have been finding time to read though.

Rather than take the iPad up to bed with me at the end of long days, I’ve started taking a book instead. I’m finally working my way through the “to read” pile (which immediately makes room for more books, but here we are).

I read “The Graduate” last week, and “A Widow for a Year” the week before that. Next up is probably “Before the Coffee Gets Cold”. I have a number of paperbacks from modern Japanese authors waiting on the shelf, and two wonderful books by Tove Jansson that I started reading some time ago and never finished – “The Winter Book”, and “The Summer Book”.

I kind of agree with the widely held idea that unless you give yourself the chance to live – to have some adventures – then you’re left with very little to write about. In some ways a good book provides a portal, doesn’t it – an escape in plain sight to a hidden world, and an unknown cast of characters.

It doesn’t help that I spend most of my waking life either in the study at home fighting with various computers, or standing in the kitchen washing up.

Perhaps I should write poetry about washing up.

On about washing up… I just walked into the kitchen and discovered everything left over from baking the cake for our youngest’s birthday strewn across the kitchen – supposedly “washed up”. I also found the dishwasher still full from last night when I switched it on at 1am. That explains no washing up – they couldn’t be bothered to empty the dishwasher, so didn’t wash up at all. Again.

I won’t even start about the mountain of dirty clothes that have been deposited in the middle of the lovely new downstairs bathroom for everybody else to enjoy the smell of.

Why? Why do even the simplest tasks have to be so hard for anybody else to do? (please excuse me while fire erupts from the top of my head). Why does wandering into the kitchen in-between work calls invariably turn into an endless round of chores?

I’ve lost count of the times the kids have seen me lugging the contents of the kitchen recycling bins out to the main bins outside. Do you think they might learn by example?

I also wonder what sort of journey of discovery their life might be once they get their own place – learning that dishes and cutlery left on the kitchen worktop won’t magically jump into the sink or the dishwasher – and that clothes left on the bathroom floor won’t magically leap into the washing machine.

I remember going through the true costs of “living” with our eldest daughter when she started looking for her own place – and seeing the hope slowly drain from her face as reality dawned on her.

(Several hours pass)

We just got home from the pub after taking my youngest daughter out to celebrate her birthday. A rare trip “out out” as a family – which roughly translates to “Dad buys everybody dinner”.

It’s been a day.

We’re now surrounded by the inevitable destruction derby that follows a birthday – plates that had cake on them, wrapping paper, empty boxes, and so on. Guess who will be standing in front of the dishwasher in a few minutes. Go on. Just guess.

Roll on tomorrow, and a call to a plumber or builder to come and look at the water tank in the loft, which has apparently decided to start pouring water onto the flat room. Because of course it has. And guess who’s first in line to deal with it.
Weird Dreams and Very Expensive Text Editors

April 9, 2026

In the moments before waking up this morning I had the worst dream in quite some time – so bad that I can still remember it, 18 hours later. I told the rest of the family about it at dinner this evening, so I suppose that might have recorded it permanently into my subconscious – who knows.

It’s funny how that works. If I type notes into the computer, I’ll invariably forget them – if I hand-write them into a bullet journal, I’m far more likely to recall them. I wonder how that works?

Perhaps I know that I don’t need to remember things that are stored in the computer, so my brain doesn’t hold on to them?

Anyway. The dream.

I was sitting at the front of a classroom, and a female teacher with dark hair walked up to me from her desk, carrying my exercise book, and slammed it down in front of me. She had a face like thunder.

I opened the exercise book to discover other people had written all over the insides of it with horrible messages about the teacher – but made it look like I had written them.

The teacher had written in red ink that she was horrified, and that I was to stay behind to talk to her. The feeling of emptines, dread, panic, and injustice was enormous – I woke up moments later with my heart racing, not really sure what was real, and what was imagined. It took a few minutes to calm down and remind myself that it had all been a dream.

Of 6course looking back, it was utter madness – I haven’t sat in a school room for decades. My dreams always seem make so much sense in the moment, but when I pick them apart they rarely make any sense at all.

So.

The title alluded to a very expensive text editor. Two days ago during a moment of weakness, I caved and bought myself a copy of iAWriter for the Mac. I gather it’s somewhat famous among the literati – very, very minimal text editor that has all kinds of quiet doo-dads to help you write. Or at least, that’s the marketing angle.

We’ll see.

This is the same person that has bounced between Obsidian, Notion, Scrivener, Google Docs, Bear, Journal, and even Visual Studio Code while writing blog posts.

Something I did realise this week – that I should have thought of some time ago – is that iCloud supports plain markdown files very nicely. So I can quite happily throw everything I’ve ever written into iCloud and access it from my phone, tablet, laptop, or desktop.

Of course this is me though, and a little voice on my shoulder starter whispering about backups. Is the cloud copy really a back-up? What if Apple delete my account? Should I not have my own copy too? I could use one of those old hard drives on the shelf over there…

And that’s how a USB caddy for an old hard drive turned up in the post today. The innards of an old desktop computer have been pressed into service as a backup drive. Of course I haven’t figured out the best way of backing things up yet, but that’s besides the point. I’m aware that Macs have a “Time Machine” function – but am not really sure if I need anything that clever.

I need to stop thinking. It’s late. I should have been in bed reading my book some time ago. I’m reading “The Graduate” by the way. Never read it before. It’s kind of hard going – the protagonist is difficult to like in the early chapters. I guess we’ll see. I’ve never seen the movie.
Just for fun

April 7, 2026

While scrolling through recent content at several of the “tent pole” social media walled gardens recently, it struck me just how many people are “in it to win it”. By that, I mean they’re either pushing a service, or endlessly preaching – telling whoever will listen what to do, when to do it, how to do it, why to do it, and so on.

Thankfully when it comes to being talked at or told what to do, I’m the world’s worst listener.

I suppose in many ways I’m a little bit like Nanny McFee – when you want me, I won’t be there – when you need me, I will – and I’m the only one that gets to decide. Wanting me to appreciate your professional marketer/publisher/editor skills that half the universe supposedly relies upon to get them traffic, book deals, fame, fortune, and everything in-between will largely fall on deaf ears.

Thankfully, I’m not interested in being famous.

I’m here for fun. I’ve always been here for fun. And for my own sanity.

I’ve been writing this blog for well over twenty years. The version of it here at Substack goes all the way back to 2003. There were posts before that too – with a little effort I could probably retrieve them. They’re most likely on ZIP disks, tucked away on the shelf alongside me. I once asked the powers at Substack if they had any plans to implement year and month endpoints like WordPress – so readers could delve into the past – they said no. Substack is about the here and now. I can’t imagine they’re too pleased that I reacted by loading six thousand posts from the distant past into their system.

I did mention that I’m not good at listening, didn’t I.

Earlier this evening I looked once again at the Commodore 64 that I very nearly pre-ordered several weeks ago. It’s a re-creation of an 8 bit home computer from the early 1980s. There’s something strangely appealing about it to me, even though the user experience would be horrendous.

Imagine a writing experience where all the computer can possibly manage to do is plaster 40 characters across the screen, and possibly two or three pages worth of text in it’s memory. Imagine having no internet connection, no other software running, and no easy way of getting files onto and off the machine.

Despite all of the misgivings and a world of negatives, the idea is still somehow appealing to me – and I can’t explain why.

Of course you’re reading a post written by the same guy that has a Windows 3 computer tucked under the desk – with Wordstar and Word Perfect (for DOS) installed on it. If you’re much younger than 50, you’ll have no idea what I’m talking about – and I’m not going to explain, because that would be mansplaining. You can go google it.

I once took part in NaNoWriMo, and wrote my fifty thousand words in two weeks on a second hand Apple iMac – one of the pretty coloured teardrop shaped Macs from the late 1990s. I still have it – it’s in the attic.

Perhaps I should get the Commodore 64 – because it we’re being brutally honest, it’s just a stepping stone – towards a mechanical typewriter.

I’ve always wanted a typewriter.
Sort of like an exhale

April 6, 2026

Many years ago I came across an article on the old Huffington Post website by Norah Ephron, and a passage within it became a personal call to arms throughout the decades that followed – a vindication that emptying my head into the keyboard is as valid as any marketing moron eschewing “how to write”, “what to write”, “when to write”, and endless guff about writing needing a purpose.

This evening I set off in search of the article, and was somewhat horrified to discover the powers atop the Huffington empire threw away much of their earlier content when re-imagining themselves as “HuffPo” – including Norah Ephron’s posts.

As you might imagine, it’s all I can do not to fill this entire post with foaming invective aimed at the clueless marketing morons that see more value in how things look than what they say.

Has the world really devolved to a point where if you perhaps only ever scroll Tiktok or Instagram, and have never read anything by anybody of consequence ever, you will only consider that which is shiny and new – and willingly disregard anything that came before?

Like I said. Horrified.

After jumping down the Internet rabbit hole, I finally found the origin of the text that has been pinned to a notice-board in the junk-room at home for at least the ten years;

one of the most delicious things about the profoundly parasitical world of blogs is that you don’t have to have anything much to say. Or you just have to have a little tiny thing to say. You just might want to say hello. I’m here. And by the way. On the other hand. Nevertheless. Did you see this? Whatever. A blog is sort of like an exhale. What you hope is that whatever you’re saying is true for about as long as you’re saying it. Even if it’s not much.

Norah’s post was published on 23rd March 2006 – just over twenty years ago – and it’s just as valid now as it was then.

It survives – more by luck than judgement – in the “Wayback Machine” – a grass roots attempt to record the entire internet for future generations. You might wonder why such a thing would ever be needed – until you discover that HuffPo have deleted all of Norah Ephron’s old articles.

Anyway.

“A blog is sort of like an exhale”.

I’m going to make use of those words every time I see some idiot trying to tell anybody what they should or should not be writing about.
Time Travelling

April 5, 2026

I’m quite proud of myself. Rather than run around in circles doing everything for everybody else, today I’ve camped out in the junk room, listened to music, scrolled the internet, tinkered with this and that, and essentially switched off from the world.

I recommend it.

While procrastinating famously, I received an email from Commodore – the long dead IT Company that made bread-bin shaped computers throughout the 1980s – before they devolved into a Voldemort-like existence for several decades – subsisting through vague mutterings during legal fights that tore the Commodore Amiga to pieces.

As an aside, it’s always struck me as entertaining that “Amiga” is the Spanish word for “Friend”, which tends to oppose the experience of any company that has ever become involved in what was left of “The Amiga” – finding themselves dragged into a running fight that’s been going on for almost as long as the storm in Jupiter’s Great Red Spot.

Anyway.

Something very unexpected happened last year.

A YouTuber and some-time actor enquired if he might license the “Commodore” name to do a “retro re-make” of the famous 1980s bread bin impersonating computer. Rather than “do a deal” with him, the owners of the trademark sold him the name. A few months later “Commodore” came back into existence, and he started perhaps the most successful kickstarter in history to resurrect the Commodore 64.

Quite why so many people still want a Commodore 64 is something of a mystery, given that your mobile phone is more powerful than a warehouse full of them – but many, many thousands did, and they’re still waiting for them now.

I was nearly waiting too.

When the newly resurrected Commodore 64 was first made available to the great unwashed public, I got as far as putting a pre-order in a shopping basket on the shiny new Commodore website. Something stopped me from heading to the checkout – possibly how I might ever explain my actions to my other half – so I walked away, and largely forgot about it. Until this evening.

The headline in the email I received this evening accused me of almost achieving time travel. I had apparently scuppered myself at the final hurdle, and the beige bread bin was still waiting for me to click the final button.

I haven’t clicked on the final button. Not yet.

Later in the evening, while considering my lucky escape from time travel, I wandered over to Instagram and began scrolling recent updates from friends. Among the selfies, cats and holiday landscapes, a row of “people you might be interested in” scrolled past – among them a face I had not seen for over twenty years.

The girl I used to work with.

After deliberating about if I should reach out or not – her account was private – I noticed her name had reverted to her maiden name, and curiosity got the better of me. In a fit of bravery – or stupidity – I clicked whatever the button is that appears in Instagram when you’re not allowed to see somebody (I’m SUCH a social media expert). Moments later my phone vibrated.

Over the next half hour a deluge of messages flew backwards and forwards – re-constructing twenty years of family history, friends, happy times, and sad times – accompanied by more smiles than I’ll readily admit to.

Isn’t it wonderful how the world can be complicated, stressful, difficult, and exhausting – but can also re-pay the mayhem and chaos in a moment?

So yes. Not only did I nearly time travel tonight – I actually time travelled too.

Long may the time travelling continue.
Friday feels like Saturday

April 4, 2026

I didn’t work today (neither did many others – the Friday and Monday on each side of Easter are bank holidays in the UK).

It’s weird – not working on a Friday. Suddenly Friday feels like Saturday, and it throws your whole body and mind out of whack. Tomorrow is going to feel like getting another Saturday for free. Of course then you worry about wasting the extra day – or at least I do.

My middle daughter didn’t get the day off – she works at the huge pub in the centre of town – Wetherspoons. We visited this evening for dinner to coincide with the start of her shift – so she could eat with us – and didn’t quite predict that half the town would have the same idea – avoiding cooking and washing up. I dread to think what sort of carnage will unfold throughout the evening, or what devastation the staff will have to deal after the last customers leave.

While eating dinner together I became aware of several voices on an adjacent table. It’s funny how some voices carry, isn’t it? The group were perhaps in their forties and fifties – and were being mansplained at by two men in particular. One was short, and very animated as he rambled on in a midlands accent about all manner of exciting adventures in sales and marketing, while the other somehow thought he was still a teenager – with a band t-shirt, perfectly scruffy hair, and combats. It didn’t help that his face gave his age away – he was either at least 60, or had aged incredibly badly. Think budget Billy Idol.

While he regaled the group with story after story about his snowboarding and fast car exploits, I wondered if anybody else was half-listening to his stories. As the thought crossed my mind, my other half conspiratorially leaned towards me and whispered “how much does that guy love himself?”.

We both smiled, and turned back to the youngest member of our party – my now nine week old grand-daughter – who, after being asleep for much of our visit was now wide awake and taking in everything around her.

It’s been fascinating – watching her develop over the last few weeks. I try not to be too involved in the day-to-day adventures – that’s for Mum and Dad to figure out. We were never helicopter parents, and we’re doing our best not to be helicopter grandparents – even though they’re living with us at the moment. I’ve always believed you learn the most when you make mistakes – so giving the kids the room to make them is incredibly important (in my mind, at least).

While walking home from the pub we spied a chap walking ahead of us that had perhaps enjoyed himself a little bit too much during his extra day off work. To begin with we wondered if he had a physical disability of some sort – but then after hearing him belch very loudly, all questions were answered. Our hearts were in our mouth as we watched him cross a road through passing traffic – I half imagined having to run into the road to retrieve him if he face-planted. We breathed a sigh of relief when he made it across in one piece.

So. I’m home again, and the remains of the day have largely gone. Midnight is racing towards me like a galloping racehorse.

I might grab one of the coffee-table books I ordered yesterday, take it up to bed with me, and fall asleep reading it. I can only imagine the eye-roll from my other half when she spies the pile of books about mathematics, physics, biology, psychology and philosophy appearing on my bedside table.

I can’t help it if I find everything interesting.

One more thing. I had a conversation with the newly upgraded Alexa this morning. After chattering about all manner of forgettable nonsense for a few minutes, I caught myself, and started giggling. She asked what I was laughing about – I told her it didn’t matter, and we went our separate ways for the day.

I wonder – how long it might be until artificial personalities can be used for therapy? Having a supportive ear during difficult times would be incredibly beneficial for most people. Does it really matter if the person you are talking to is real or not? In some ways, the conjured avatar is no more than a talking diary – and perhaps that’s all most people really need – a sounding board.

There’s a lot of hoodoo spouted about AI from people with no idea about how it really works, or what it’s really doing. Fear, uncertainty, and doubt.

I’ll ask you a question.

Why is it that we can live through numerous adventures, read wonderful stories, admire beautiful paintings, and watch exciting movies – and then create our own works based on everything we have experienced – and yet computers are not allowed to do the same?

Perhaps it’s all just fear of change?

Anyway.

It’s late.

I should really stop typing, shut down, and try to stop thinking about anything and everything quite so much.

p.s. I started exploring Substack earlier today (while I should really have been getting on with something else), and discovered a veritable smorgasbord of wonderful bloggers. Old school bloggers – people emptying their head into the keyboard. My faith in the internet and it’s ability to connect us has been restored somewhat.
The Witching Hour

April 2, 2026

The clock ticked past 1am a few minutes ago, and reminded me that I haven’t written in a few days. This seems to be the “new normal” for me – that I manage to throw a few words at the computer every few days at best.

We’re racing head-long into a four day weekend here for Easter. I’ll try not to write another tear-down of the major religions accidentally on-purpose inventing fabricated celebrations to coincide with ancient pagan events.

I’m almost giddy at the prospect of four days off. I’m forming a mental list of all the things I won’t get done.

I really do need to take a break from everything. Read books. Watch movies. Go RUNNING!

On the subject of watching movies, we have a new television turning up tomorrow, after learning that Satellite TV in the UK could be no more in another three years time. Our dish was accidentally moved by the people that cleaned our gutters – and the guy that came out and fixed it remarked about the satellite(s) coming to the end of their useful life, and there being no plans to replace them yet.

The new TV will have all the usual streaming internet services built in – so no more Fire TV, Apple TV, Roku, or whatever else needed. One TV remote to rule them all.

Anyway. It’s getting late.

I need to go sleep. Or at least read a few pages of my book before waking up in the early hours with it propped against my chest. It’s a skill.
Four days off

April 2, 2026

Work has finished for Easter. Four days in the pursuit of doing as little as possible. Of course I know that won’t happen, but I can dream. I will admit to doing something of a happy dance earlier when I saw the weather forecast for tomorrow – a good chance of rain, which means I won’t be able to cut the grass. What a shame.

Just after finishing work this evening Amazon informed me that we’ve been given “early access” to Alexa+. Quite how it’s “early access” is something of a mystery, given that my Dad has had access to it for several weeks, and friends in the US have had it for months.

I just had a rather unnerving conversation with Alexa about my musical tastes, how our respective weeks have been, and what she might be able to do for me. We have several Echo Show devices around the house – they’ve had a massive upgrade to their user interface – it’s going to take some getting used to.

Our new television also arrived this evening – that replaces the old TV, Apple TV box, Firestick, and satellite receiver. One controller to rule them all, and in the darkness bind them. The primary reason for getting the television is it’s primary source is the internet – it’s not really designed to be plugged into an aerial – and yet, while setting it up I spied the coax connector on the back for the satellite dish – so plugged it in.

It turns out the new TV can not only see “FreeSat” channels – it can see absolutely everything available from the ageing Astra satellite that serves the UK. 600 channels of utter slop. After setting it up I scrolled through and found all manner of low-budget eastern-european news channels, dubbed soap operas, and movie channels filled with films nobody has heard of.

This brings about the natural question of “what happens to the old television?”. I now have it propped on the desk behind me in the junk room – wired up to the retired Apple TV. I can now watch Star Wars while I’m supposed to be working. Granted, I could do that before, but now I can half-watch it on a 48” screen that covers half the wall.

Guess who’s going to be playing Zelda on a 48” TV later. Just guess.

I suppose I should really go Easter egg shopping tomorrow for my family. We’re all supposed to be “being good” this year – trying to not eat so much junk. I have no doubt we’ll figure out some excuse as to why we’re allowed a “cheat weekend”.

A friend messaged me a few minutes ago – telling me she wants to read a blog post about me having been running, instead of about wanting to go running. She’s got a point.

Right.

I’m only really writing this to avoid getting on with anything else. It’s a skill. I’ve been practicing it for decades. It should probably have belts like karate. A black belt in avoidance and procrastination. Where karate has “drunken man” technique, perhaps I could have “sofa surfer” technique?

I’ll shut up now. I’m rambling. And procrastinating.