Changelog 2025-02

Something happened earlier in the year, my Google Assistant stopped adding items to my shopping list. It used to sync with my notes and I could check it on my phone or PC, and I’m sure you know how a digital shopping list works. But one day instead of adding peas, I got the reply “Sorry, something went wrong,” and it never worked again.

The same thing happened to calendar events. They were always a bit wonky, but now I can’t create them at all, instead I get a google search result for calendars. Same, I can’t control my music. Unless I’m not asking for music, then sometimes it’ll play something awful and loud. This usually happens I’m trying to set white noise before bed.

I don’t know what happened to the dream of the voice assistant, but despite all the ‘ai’ hype, they seem to be in a state of managed decline.

I’ve heard Siri is similarly frustrating. My parents seem to do ok with Alexa, but all they do is music, weather and, sigh, the shopping list.

Xmas was nice at my parents’ place. I’ve been driving up and back a bit more often now I have an EV. The Hyundai Getz was a champion of a car, but it was extremely uncomfortable without cruise control, blew out almost 70 kilos of CO2 for each trip, and cost about the same in fuel. I get basically free EV charging and I try to only charge it during the day when there’s plenty of sunlight in the grid. But even charged up on coal power it’s more efficient and lower emissions than burning petrol. It’s a good feel.

New Years was at my place. It’s one of my favourite nights of the year because you get to hang out with your friends for basically no reason at all, and everyone’s onboard with it.

This one wasn’t as big as previous years, but I enjoyed it a lot. The party held on to almost 11 o’clock (it was scheduled to end at 10 because people are old and like to go to bed apparently), then I rode my bike around the river to watch the midnight fireworks.

I woke up with a stinking hangover despite not drinking, so my first new years resolution was to drink more water.

Once the Brisbane to Gold Coast ride was over, one of my medium term to-do-list items was to join a gym. I did a few sessions of Pilates with T but it was too glamorous and Hype and not really my scene. My plan was to walk into a few gyms along my street (there’s several), but the first one I looked at I kinda fell in love with and signed up for training and general access.

On the weekends it only opens in the mornings, which doesn’t vibe with my night owlitude. But I’ve set the alarm on my watch to tap me on the wrist at 7 every day for the past month or so, which is also when my home automation turns the lights on in my room. So I’m slowly shifting my circadian rhythm into something more suitable for a latitude with 5am sunrise. It feels good.

It’s been about 6 years since I last stepped in a gym, so the first time I had a session I was a wreck. I got so dizzy and messed up we had to schedule a second session to try again. I’m still not amazing at leg stuff without a decent rest, but I’m getting there.

My goal for the moment is to just get better and make the numbers go in the right direction, and it’s been a satisfying process. But the thing I didn’t really expect is how much this has become a Third Place for me. Everyone is super friendly, sometimes the trainers will come up for a chat, and that vibe rubs off on the people who go there too. I saw a bunch of peeps sitting in a circle chatting this arvo before one of the group classes, and on Wednesdays they have some sort of bubacise where all the new mums come and leave their babies laying around while they work out. It’s extremely cute.

It’s not like hanging out at the pub or anything, but it feels a like community and it’s nice. Not what I would have put on my must-have list, but it’s much better than the soulless individualism of the Anytime Fitnesses for instance.

Not a lot else has been happening really. I’ve been working on a few coding projects:

I’ve been reading a bit more after having found an ereader that works for me. Turns out an enormous A4 sized reader is uncomfortable and difficult and makes me not want to read. The Kobo Clara Colour is small, cheap, cute, and got me back into the groove. And I set up a books section on my website which is basically a frontend to Goodreads so you can see what I’ve been reading if you’re so inclined.

I’ve also written a little bot to administer an OpenTTD game server. I got into it over the xmas break like seemingly a lot of other people, and wanted to run a server. The rush has died down so it’s basically unused now, but if you want to have a game sometime let me know. I was about to publish the source code but I just realised the git history has a password in it so I’ll need to rewrite it lolol.

I’ve also been writing a Bluesky crossposting tool to take posts from Mastodon and duplicate them on BS. I don’t super like the platform but I have a couple of friends on there and I’m less interested in the tech than, you know, the social graph. Our Brisbane Mastodon server is still going strong though if you want to sign up and hang out 🙂

Another tool I wrote moderates the Mastodon trending section to automatically remove posts with certain keywords. It’s useful given the death throes of a certain superpower.

I’ve also been having fun with writing little string codecs for a project at work. I don’t know if you know (or care) but gzip compression is natively available to Javascript in the browser nowadays, so I’ve been messing around with that, as well as other hand-rolled compression algorithms. It’s been fun. There’s no docs yet, but you can check out the tests in the repo if you’re as nerdy as me.

It’s midway through February already, even though it still feels novel to be 2025. But I’m looking forward to going camping again in a few months when it’s a bit cooler. I’m keen to keep up the gym, and also keep cycling on the side. I’d like to take a little time off work specifically to do some creative writing and finish a couple more short stories. Maybe also finish replacing my gas cooktop with induction – a very long running project that turned out to be more involved than I’d hoped.

So that’s about it from me. What are you up to this year?

14 July 202414 July 2024

Come To Daddy – West End

A bar with a neon sign out the front reads "Daddy", and a bunch of people stand around out the front. Their faces are blurred because, y'know, they didn't ask to have their photo taken.

I wrote a few weeks back about the opening of a local queer bar, Come To Daddy. I really like it, it’s nice to have it just down the road, and they do food and a decent mocktail.

But it’s been my bugbear that they don’t have a website and I have to go to Instagram to find out what’s happening. I had to sign up for an account because it seems half the internet is behind Meta’s paywall these days.

Anyway I just checked my bank statement and guess who has a website after all?

That’s right, cometodaddy.au (West End gay bar) has existed all this time, just it hasn’t shown up in search results. So I thought I’d link to it and maybe prompt the spiders to start spidering.

We went for lunch this Sunday. We rocked up at 1:30, which is when their brunch menu ends and their regular menu begins. We saw a couple of massive big breakfasts go past, but I was more interested in the parmi (parma on the menu).

The food was alright. The Croque Daddy wasn’t super crunchy, and the schnitzel was on the cheaper side, but the chips were great and the coleslaw was the star of the show. It really surprised me because I don’t usually even like it, but this was super fresh and the dressing was really nice.

I rate the place. This wasn’t fine dining, but it was about what I expected. I’ll have to head back for the brunch sometime. Want to come with? Hit me up.

12 July 202412 July 2024

Friday at 01:28 – a letter to Airservices Australia

It starts as an indeterminate sound, I don’t even know how to describe it. But shortly after you get the high frequencies and you know it’s a plane. As it gets closer you hear the air start to tear apart, the echo all around the concrete canyons of the apartment complexes. Until finally, the bass rumble in your chest.

As it passes overhead, or even as it passes a suburb across, I can look out my window and see the planes. My bedroom window.

Then, as soon as it’s arrived, it’s gone again. Fading out into the distance and you’re left wondering, when will the next one come? Is that it, can I hear it? Or is it my imagination?

Sometimes, the next one will arrive immediately. You’ll have plane after plane after plane, a constant roar like the other morning starting at 6am. Sometimes there’s only a couple, like tonight.

A couple at midnight.

Again at 1am.

The 01:55 flight to Dubai.

No rhyme or reason.

I’m laying here trying to get to sleep, but my chest is just filled with anxiety. It’s a terrible sound. It’s a terrible thing to live with these machines flying across your home at all hours.

It’s terrible that someone made the decision to deliberately change the flight path.

There are tens of thousands of people living in this suburb, let alone all the others.

And I wonder how much the noise pollution is taking its toll on them. As it is me.

5 May 20245 May 2024

Brisbane comedy festival, queer spaces, and EV races

This weekend has been a blast. It’s the Brisbane Comedy Festival so on Friday I went to see Josh Thomas’ Lets Tidy Up.

Comedian, gay, neurodiverse, and ex Brisbane kid. I loved his TV stuff and I just find him endearing, so I booked two tickets and couldn’t find anyone other than Ben who would go with me.

This is a show where Josh tidies up. Tidying up is not normally the stuff of gripping drama, it wouldn’t be a propulsive narrative for most people, but for Josh it’s Everest, a fundamentally impossible task, like trying to defy the moon and control the tides.
Brisbane Comedy Festival Program

We had Korean for dinner, then decided to drive because the Powerhouse is not well connected to public transit (the CityCat takes AGES) and it was threatening to rain.

We couldn’t get parking so we ended up driving around and taking scooters the rest of the way anyway. But it was a fun night.

The Powerhouse from riiiiight up the back, the stage is lit green and has the words Josh repeated over and over. People are still taking their seats.

The next day I was going to have breakfast with another friend and I’m actually kind of glad it was cancelled because I was not prepared to wake up that morning. Thankfully neither was she, so I had a bit of a sleep in and sat around doing not much until the afternoon.

Then I caught up with Dan who was in the area for the grand opening of a new local queer bar Come To Daddy. Hilarious name, puns abound.

It’s a 5 minute walk from my place but I hadn’t heard anything about it! It’s not really in Google and it seems like they’re only on Instagram. And even so, only barely ¯_(ツ)_/¯

But we wandered down shortly after opening, grabbed a drink and a seat, and people filtered in until it was standing room only. Then there was an amusing welcome to country to christen the bar (yarma!), and I saw my first ever drag queen pianist (playing “Daddies Everywhere” to the tune of “Love is in the Air”).

The queue for the bar was super long so we only had a couple of drinks before calling it a night. But I’m keen to head back soon.

Dan and I, two guys taking a selfie on the street in front of a crowded but not very in-focus bar.

The next morning I went to the little “health food store” and bought some “health food” (chocolate coated freeze dried strawberries and ginger), then headed down to Amanda and Colin’s place in my new EV.

I got the MG4 EV because I’ve been doing a lot of travel back and forth to my parents place in Maryborough, which emits about 70 kilos of CO2 round trip. Apparently when you burn fuel in an engine it doesn’t just disappear, who knew! Also it’s a lot more comfortable than the Hyundai Getz I was borrowing from my folks, with all the mod cons like cruise control and headlamps that actually illuminate the road.

I arrived a bit early so when I took a wrong turn I was happy to just meander around the streets admiring how much the suburbs of the Gold Coast look kinda just like the suburbs where I grew up north of Brisbane. I also went up a hill and cruised right back down, excitedly watching the regenerative braking put a bunch of power back into the batteries.

I said I would bring “some sausage rolls or something”, but Amanda really wanted to put on a Scottish lunch. So we had scotch pies with mash and beans, and Irn Bru as a palate cleanser. It was amazing and I felt very special.

I don’t have any pics, other than this one where I found the cap for the charger had been flapping around where I forgot to replace it for the past week.

By the time I got home it was already kinda late so I made dinner (I got the tastiest turkish bread from Coles yesterday after visiting Daddy), then started faffing around with my web site.

I wanted a place to share links to stories I’ve enjoyed reading, or would like to refer back to. So a few weeks back I set up a bookmarks page, as well as an RSS feed that you can subscribe to wherever you get your feeds.

But as I was testing the RSS feed I had to go digging around in my subscriptions, and it was kind of nice to go back and see all the feeds from various people I’ve subscribed to over the years. If I stumble on an interesting looking personal site I try to subscribe, and keep that small web spirit alive.

Some people post once every few years. Some people never post again. And long story short that’s why I took a moment to write about my weekend. Also it’s #WeblogPoMo2024 (HT rachsmith.com).

So how about you, what have you been up to?

4 September 2023

First weekend of spring

On Saturday I woke up with a vague sense of unease and decided to fix it by cleaning the house. Kitchen, laundry, bedroom, floors. I didn’t have anywhere to be so as I noticed tasks I did them, and it left my place feeling like a great space to be.

It’s been feeling like spring for most of winter, it’s been a very mild one. But nevertheless the sun has swung around and I’m getting more light in my place now. I can leave my doors open (screens closed) to let air circulate, and the plants are having a great time.

It is a time of optimism and, well, occasionally having to put that climate anxiety back on the shelf. But largely optimism.

Riverfire 2023

I didn’t get up to much during the day but in the evening I decided to head out to watch the Riverfire fireworks.

It’s usually packed in South Bank and everywhere really, so I though I’d roll around on my bike and find a spot. Turns out the Kurilpa Bridge was open and you could just hang out and watch from there. I didn’t have an amazing view, but it was a nice $0 activity that took almost no effort on my part.

The crows on the Kurilpa Bridge. Someone brought a picnic mat, but quickly abandoned it to stand by the railing.

There was a small contingent of folks on the balcony at GOMA.

On the way home I stopped at the William Jolly Bridge because there’s a light installation underneath now. That night it was lit in rainbow colours and looked fetching in the eerie firework smoke.

Sunday funday with these idiots

Ben came over and we went to Banette, the little French bakery.

They revamped their menu and they’re providing table service now so it’s a proper place to dine out. I was really happy to see their sad and crusty Croque Monsieur from the hot box is now freshly made, along with a number of other breakfasty options.

So we had brunch for lunch. It was pretty great. I don’t imagine I’ll get this too often, but it was a decadent but not too heavy option and the greenery really rounded it out. I’m very pleased.

Mrs Crunchy with a fried egg and salad on a plate

After that we went on a nursery crawl and looked at all the plants.

I’m trying to be a bit frugal since I changed jobs and accidentally went 6 weeks between proper pay cheques, so I only picked up a couple of little friends and a colourful pot because I need to re-pot one of my plants.

But Mappins also has fish and they were very cute and I really wanted to take one home with me. That might be a separate project needing a bit more research, but I reckon it could be a good hobby.

A brightly coloured pot with a couple of grean leafies inside.

26 January 202328 January 2023

Homemade pesto, the new bike, book recommendations and bne.social – a blog

Tonight for dinner I made pesto pasta. It was made all the more delicious by the fact I grew the basil myself, in my own little urban garden, and made pesto from scratch.

My little garden has grown a lot since spring. With the new tower next door finally being built I don’t think I’m going to get any sun at all over winter. So I’m not sure how everything will go over the newly imposed seasons. But it’s best to remain in the moment and admire the basil, parsley, spinach, and multitude of chillis I’ve managed to grow.

A chilli plant. There are white flowers and little green chillis starting to grow. — My chilli plants have started to flower, and this one has little fruits forming.

So dinner was great and I feel very accomplished even though the pasta was store-bought.

Today was any other day. It’s January 26th and I made the decision to work today and take tomorrow off. Part tokenistic, part wanted the long weekend, and partly because I have a bunch of work on my plate at the moment and wanted a chance to get it done in peace.

But let’s not talk about work.

I wanted to write a little retro because it feels like I haven’t been up to much, but I know I have and wanna get it all down.

Time for a new bike

In big news I broke my bike. Snapped the frame nearly in two.

I faffed around for months before finally getting myself a bike fit and starting the process of building a bike that’s gonna last me the next ten years. Unfortunately we’re in a bit of a supply chain crisis at the moment, so looking at months lead time with no bike I picked myself up a cheaper single-speed to get me by.

It’s been an absolute treat.

A blue bike frame with a crack running horizontally above the bottom bracket. You can see through it. — The scary thing is I rode this home.

A black bike with neon blue rims in front of a garden. — The scary thing is I rode this home.

Truth be told now I have my single speed I’m not entirely sure what I want from my next bike. I know being a heavier guy I’m gonna destroy this one, which is why I want to build something more solid.

But I’m really loving the simplicity of the single-speed system, as well as how powerful it makes me feel climbing hills in entirely the wrong gear. It’s really good exercise. Follow me on Strava if you’re so inclined.

Reading is what?

Over the new year break I had a week to myself and I was driving myself up the wall. Not because of boredom, but with panic that I couldn’t work out what to do with myself. So I picked up a book.

A few, actually. I’ve been really enjoying reading again. This year I’ve gone through:

Tom Ballard’s I Millenial – I don’t even know how to summarise this one, other than to say it’s a neat summary of what led to our current day political clusterfuck through a socialist lens. It was a surprise, a joy, and led nicely into the next:
The Big Switch by Saul Griffith. It’s a pretty plainly laid out argument that Australia can take action on climate change right now with current technology by replacing all our fossil powered machines with electric ones, putting solar on our roofs, using electric cars to power our houses at night, and save huge amounts of money in the long run. Obviously there’s nuances, but the point is to go all in on the technologies we currently have, while we develop the solutions to the harder climate problems. And the government is listening.
I also picked up Stephen Fry’s Mythos which was interesting because I’d never studied greek mythology before, and it was an okay introduction to it. I found it a bit of a slow going, something about milllenia-old stories not having all the hooks of a modern page-turner. But it was interesting connecting the dots on concepts that trace back all the way back.

I think e-ink

After getting excited about it I put in an order for a Kobo reader from JB. The only ones in stock were all the way down on the Gold Coast so I scooted to the train just in time for them to call me to say there’s an error and they don’t have it after all.

A Kobo ereader on the couch showing Tim Richards Heading South book in black & white. there's a bright pink cable coming out the side.

So I sat with the thought and eventually talked myself out of the cheaper device and into the Kobo Elipsa, which finally arrived the other day. And honestly it’s pretty great.

I’ve got three books on the go:

Pictured is Heading South by Tim Richards. It’s a travel journal along the second-longest rail journey in Australia, from Queensland to Western Australia. (Fun* fact, the longest is from Queensland to the Northern Territory just due to the inefficient route, but that’s not as exciting)
At Tae’s recommendation I’m reading Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club. It’s funny, very easy to read, and I can’t wait to find out whodunnit.
I’ve also picked up the latest episode of Meanjin on a whim. I don’t know if it’s my usual style but I’ve been enjoying the short essays and different perspectives, and wanted to see how to transfer an ebook onto the Kobo 😆

The Kobo itself is great. I didn’t think I’d use the notetaking nearly as much as I have been, but it’s very slick. I’ve found myself making little checklists and notes that I’d ordinarily add to my phone, as well as keeping my workday organised. Maybe it’s a write-off!

Then there’s the social network

Josh and I have been running bne.social for coming up on a year now. I haven’t written about it yet even though I’ve been meaning to because I don’t know quite how to sum it up.

It’s basically like Twitter without the nazis and the queerphobia, and it’s run by volunteers around the world rather than being owned by one single billionaire idiot. It’s not without its problems but most people agree it’s a Nice Place where the interactions are genuine and it’s not filled with Brands.

I’d encourage you to hop over and make an account and hang out with us! We’re going to organise a meetup or Brisbane folks at some point, so don’t miss out.

A cartoon of a mastodon in a summer hat at South Bank as an ibis swoops in to steal a chip.

Yeah that’s about it I suppose

I dunno, things are good. There’s more I could write about; my perfection of the banana-blueberry smoothie, the way I’ve optimised the lighting in my apartment to keep my indoor plants alive, the absolute classic CDs I picked up at the lifeline bookfest.

But for now I wanna go read some more The Thursday Murder Club and go to sleep, cos tomorrow the long weekend starts and I have a bike ride to do!

21 May 202221 May 2022

Remote work from the gay pub

Friday lunch at the Wickham, Brisbane’s local gay pub, is one of my favourite new traditions.

The exterior of The Wickham Hotel, a three story pub with palm trees out the front. It's overcast.

The neon flower lounge, surrounded by plants, a brown leather couch and a wall mosaic of pop culture

I’ve been intending to go on Fridays because it’s a great spot, there’s plenty of places to work, and it helps keep the lights on at a place that’s important to me. This is where I’ve met a lot of my friends, done a lot of growing as a person, and really it’s a nice spot to be.

It’s been wet, and I’ve had other commitments so I’ve only been twice in the past month but each time it’s been great.

Last night my friend R arrived after work and we stuck around for a few drinks which turned into a bottle of wine back at my place, where he stayed on the couch for the night (he lives on an island, it’s a trek).

For a person who “doesn’t drink” I have a low grade hangover this morning. Coffee is brewing now.

This is part of how I’ve been getting a bit more experimental with how I’m approaching remote work in a pandemic world. There’s a bunch of picnic shelters down by the river that I’ve been working at from time to time, and the local coffee shop has pretty good outdoor seating. Depending on my meeting load it’s not always possible to do, but I think it’s important to get out and be a part of the world.

2 March 2022

Brisbane floods

Thursday

I saw a tweet earlier today along the lines of “I don’t like living in interesting times”, and I thought it was amusing. Referring to the alleged Chinese curse which from memory I don’t think is real, but is very clever nonetheless, “may you live in interesting times”.

Sometimes an idea will get stuck in my head, a wordplay usually, and repeat over and over until I put it into the world. Throughout the pandemic my little brainworm is a similar corruption, “you may live in interesting times”.

Among other world disasters, the one a little closer to home right now is the effects of La Niña on East coast Australia. Earlier this year the Bruce Highway was washed away by flooding near Tiaro, and just yesterday a freight train derailed on the north coast line when the track washed away. We’ve had a lot of rain.

Yesterday the ABC made passing reference to the Brisbane River catchment, which put me on edge. My place is in a low lying area and while I think technically it’s above the council’s flood level, I don’t especially want to risk it. I was pretty annoyed that it was mentioned in a single article with no follow up at all, so I suppose we’re probably not going to flood? I’m sure I’d know about it.

It’s been on my mind because I was planning to visit my parents this weekend, the weekend of my birthday. But between the rail catastrophe and breathless news reports advising people not to travel, I’m sort of thinking I’ll stay in after all.

Anyway, I’m doing fine. Just really aware of the emergency fatigue that’s probably got everyone to some degree.

So I’m sitting outside in the dark wearing trakky daks, hanging out with my plants. There’s the white noise of raindrops hitting the leaves in the garden and pattering down onto the courtyard. A streetlight across the road lights up the sheets of rain as they blow past. And occasionally a car will drive by and make the cosiest wet asphalt sound you can imagine.

I do like the rain.

It’s cosy.

Gezellig.

Reminds me of the summer storms in my childhood home, beating down on a tin roof so hard you could barely hear each other talk. Looking out the window at a wall of water while being inside, safe and dry.

We may live in interesting times, but at least there’s comfort in the familiar. I don’t know if I’m going to see my parents tomorrow, I suppose I’ll have to make that call to the QR support line. In the meantime, no point worrying right?

Friday

A screenshot of the message from QR travel: QJ11 Tilt Train 25 Feb is cancelled with no alternate arrangements. Another notification forecasts rain.

The train line is still out. Now the highway is out.

Deep Creek (ironic name, it was a trickle when I was there) has gone over the highway. This kinda blows my mind.

I know Gympie floods, I read as much when I visited last year. All the riverside infrastructure is concrete and brutalist to survive the water going over it.

At Alford Park, there’s a massive great flood marker showing where all the historic floods have reached. Pretty scary stuff.

Anyway, it’s just weird because that road bridge is SO high I would never have expected it to go under. At least that’s the decision made for me.

Undearneath the Bruce Highway bridge. It's suuuuper tall. There's old wooden foundations from what I can only assume is the old bridge.

Saturday

Sunday

I hardly slept last night. I kept waking up to check the river wasn’t lapping at my door. It wasn’t, but that just meant it hadn’t happened yet.

Tae lost power. She’s in a low-lying part of the neighbourhood. She came over to charge up all her bits and bobs and we watched TV and chatted for a bit. I fell asleep and slept for what felt like hours.

The rain still hasn’t stopped, so Tae decided to just make a run for it. I got drenched just opening the gate to let her out. I can’t imagine what it would be like riding in that.

The forecast is looking pretty grim, but the flooding is supposed to coincide with high tide tomorrow at about 8.

Monday

Tuesday

By the time I got up the street was already completely cleared. You wouldn’t have known it had flooded if it wasn’t for the people cleaning out the businesses that were inundated.

I was expecting to get out with my shovel picking up trash. But Peter told me the RCC Builders from the construction sites were all out cleaning up the streets in the early hours. I suppose it benefits them not tracking mud everywhere, but it’s such a nice thing to do. I’m very grateful.

The river is down about five steps at the end of my street. Enough to clear water from most of the streets around here.

Looking down a staircase into water and slick brown mud. There's still trees submerged, poking out of the river

I went for a little walk down Duncan Street way. I don’t know what to call that little precinct of West End but it’s the built up area, as opposed to the gritty sort of partially industrial area I live in. There were a lot of pumps running to pull water out of basements, and some that were completely full to the top.

Peter’s was full to the top.

He told me the building manager was here for the ’11 floods, and the painstaking lengths they had to go to to clean out the mud and debris from two levels of basements. I think the mud army can probably help, but it’s going to be days before that water clears.

His lift was out, and the emergency stairs led to deep water, so we had to climb a ladder from the lobby to get to the stairs, to get to his apartment. It’s the penultimate floor, which is ordinarily lovely, but absolutely destroyed me. I’ve been working on my cardio fitness, but apparently there’s still a ways to go.

I had my first hot shower in 2 days, and left a powerbank to charge, just in case. I also guzzled all the water in his jug because, as I realised later, I was super dehydrated from not taking care of myself the previous days.

It’s Tuesday afternoon and I’m surprised to find I still have ice cubes. Most of them are stuck together, swimming in a puddle in the bottom of the ice cream container where I store them. But there’s a few separate blocks. I scoop em out and put them in my glass of warm cola.

Later that afternoon Peter, the ghost of Adam, and I went to a town hall organised by Jonathan Sri and Amy McMahon, council and state representatives, respectively.

There was a free sausage sizzle and people sitting around powerboards charging their devices. Real disaster vibes, but I think folks were largely okay.

Jonno and Amy on the mic, next to a portable loudspeaker.

It was a useful meeting. But the message I got was that while the flood waters are still up and there’s not a lot we can do until they go down. I get the feeling everyone just wants to do something but we can really only wait until we know more.

As I was walking home past the gym I noticed the lights were on.

“Great” I thought, I can go there for a warm shower.

Then I realised the lights were on in my building too.

There were people milling around the street outside one a that was still dark. A lady was gesticulating at the utility closet that had been beeping for two days straight, so I went over and offered to let them charge their stuff at mine. Her kid proudly told me how they’d been using candles and a lantern, it was cute.

There’s a kind of survivor’s guilt in all this, I try not to indulge too much. I lost power for a couple of days, and the basement that I never use got flooded with 30cm of water. That’s nothing, right?

But then I realise I’ve been amped up on stress for the past week, I’ve lost the contents of my fridge and freezer, my backpack and a pair of shoes are ruined because they just couldn’t dry out, I’ve got loads of washing strewn all in the laundry because they asked us to conserve water before the power went out, I have a sunburn and a caffeine withdrawal headache because I regularly forgot to feed or water myself while everything else was going on.

I don’t need to feel guilty because I got my damn power back.

Wednesday

The dishwasher and washing machine are humming away. I appreciate the breeze from the fan. It’s 31 and partly cloudy. Humidity is cloying. But we’ll work things out.

24 May 202028 January 2023

Heading back to Australia in times of Coronavirus

It has been SO hard being in Amsterdam away from my partner, friends, family and all the people I love during the pandemic and I need to fix that. So in some very bittersweet news I am returning to Australia.

As far as I know the only flights to Australia are repatriation flights from Hong Kong, Los Angeles, and London via Qantas. I missed the first round of flights, but another 6 opened up from London and after speaking to work I decided I wanted to be on one.

The TLDR

14 day quarantine on arrival into Australia
Organised on a state by state basis, and rules constantly in flux
Up to 2 “care packages” can be picked up from within the city by staff. Not all items are allowed.
Non-perishable grocery deliveries allowed from Woolworths
Laundry quota twice a week
Once a week supervised outside exercise allowed
Free internet access 🎉 as well as movies

I’ve scanned the documents outlining Victoria’s quarantine procedures as of May 23 into a Google Docs folder.

Getting to London

Getting to London was not difficult from Amsterdam because The Netherlands doesn’t have any measures preventing travel.

The UK seems to be accepting folks with the same visa restrictions as before, providing they have a valid onward journey. I couldn’t find this information anywhere online and only found out when I was unable to check-in online.

At the KLM check-in desk I was able to check-in by showing the details for my Australia flight, even though it was on a different day. Others were not so lucky. One man in the queue was advised to “book a train or a bus ticket” before he was allowed to check into the London flight.

On the London side I passed through the automated security check with no hassles at all, and didn’t speak to another human.

Uber in London doesn’t seem to have any real preventative measures in place, but the taxis in the cab rank had sealed partitions between the driver & passenger which made it an easy choice.

Checking into the repatriation flight

Before check-in, Qantas sent a COVID-19 health screen form which could be filled out online at the check-in desk.

In addition to the obvious “do you have COVID-19” question, they also asked:

Are you diagnosed or suspected to have pneumonia or COVID-19 infection?
Have you been in contact with someone that is a suspected (being tested) or confirmed a COVID-19 case in the last 14 days?
Have you been on a cruise ship or in a shared accommodation setting such as a hostel in the last 14 days?
Do you currently or have you recently felt unwell with any of the following symptoms:

Feverish, fatigued or aching
Cold or flu like symptoms such as runny nose, cough or sore throat
Shortness of breath

I’m not sure what answering yes to any of these would mean because again I couldn’t find info about it online.

A card reads: COVID-19 Health Screen Approved

Heathrow was a total clusterfuck. Security took about 30 minutes and it wasn’t possible to social distance because of the layout of the queues winding tightly back on each other. This didn’t stop them from putting up signs advising you to do so, and thankfully almost everyone was wearing masks.

Once cleared, there was a final health check to measure temperature, etc before we were given a little green pass and allowed to board.

Flying to Australia

A yellow bag with a biohazard label

Upon boarding the flight we were handed a yellow biohazard bag containing spare face masks, hand sanitizer, a pen, an immigration card & several spare bio bags.

Contact was kept to a minimum, and after meals any remaining garbage was only collected in the bio bags.

The flight was a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, which had three groups of three seats per row in economy. People were distanced at one person per three seats, and spaced so that nobody was sitting directly in front or behind anyone in the next row.

We were all required to wear masks, and they say the HEPA filters take out the majority of nasties so it’s about as safe as you can get locked up in an airplane for 22 hours. But of course, nothing’s a given.

I remember being relieved they did anything at all. There was no info on the Qantas website about it so I was preparing for the worst, but it was well implemented. I felt a lot more relaxed on the plane (aside from the woman sitting near me who kept taking her mask off and wearing it on her chin. Some people!)

I got to see both a sunset and a sunrise. Watching the sun come up through the tinted Dreamliner windows was beautiful: a giant purple-red orb rising through the clouds, looking like a fiery gas giant in alien solar system.

Sunset from a plane window

Melbourne via Perth

Since the flight to Australia is too long for conventional aircraft, there’s usually a stop-over somewhere in Asia or the Middle East. None of the countries that I know of are allowing transit at the moment. Instead the flight ran directly to Perth to refuel before continuing to Melbourne.

The stop in Perth was brief. We didn’t leave our seats, we just sat waiting for the crew to change over and the refuel to finish. I lost track of the time because I was sleepy, but Flightradar24 says it took about an hour and a half.

The final leg of the trip to Melbourne was fairly uneventful.

The Crown. Or in Spanish, La Corona

What happens when you land in Australia?

The very first thing is another temperature check & health screen. This wasn’t the quickest procedure, so we queued in the aerobridge while this was taking place.

Once cleared we were given a detention notice from the Victorian government, letting us know that we would be quarantined for 14 days which we were required to sign.

A state of emergency exists in Victoria under section 198 of the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008 (Vic), because of the serious risk to public health posed by COVID-19.

You must proceed immediately to the vehicle that has been provided to take you to the hotel. Once you arrive at the hotel you must proceed immediately to the room you have been allocated. You must not leave the room in any circumstances

Finally, we were given the information about the hotel we would be staying in. In my case, the Crown Metropol in the center of Melbourne which was cordoned off especially for this.

After that we were herded onto the tarmac and boarded buses directly to our hotel. There was no social distancing on the bus, but we were required to wear our masks through the whole process.

The quarantine

The hotel is a quarantine zone so nobody other than staff and occupants are allowed in.

When the bus arrived we were shepherded off one at a time and given our room number, a care package of various snacks, toiletries & necessities, and many pages of documentation about how things work.

This was the first time I learned anything solid about ANYTHING to do with the quarantine. Before now I’d only heard rumours.

As I understand it’s a rapidly evolving situation, and it’s managed on a state-by-state basis which is possibly why the Federal government has no information for travellers.

I’ve scanned the documents outlining Victoria’s quarantine procedures as of May 23 into a Google Docs folder, which has a lot more info on how everything works.

My experience

Through this time I’ve been an anxious mess but now that I’m in the hotel I’m finally starting to relax.

The hotel room is bigger than my apartment in Amsterdam by a large margin so even though I’m locked in I’m feeling much less cooped up.

The meals so far have been pretty good, all things considered. There’s far too much food provided at any given mealtime, but that leaves plenty of other items for snacks in between.

The hotel, security, and health staff have been absolutely amazing and I’m so grateful to be able to come home. The amount of love and support and human connection I’ve had from everyone while in isolation this past week is truly overwhelming, and I’m beginning to feel that just maybe things are going to be okay <3

22 September 201828 January 2023

Hey, I moved to Europe

It happened almost by accident that I moved overseas.

I've always had it in the back of my head that I'd like to work internationally at some point in my life. Just a year ago I was honoured to be invited to speak at a conference in Amsterdam, and It was my first time leaving the Asia/Pacific region. It was a total blast and was really nice to make new friends around the world, but it kinda set a few ideas going in my head.

So when I saw an off-hand remark from a school friend about an opportunity to work in the Netherlands, I followed it up nonchalantly. This started a chain reaction that ended with me selling all my stuff, renting out my apartment, and moving to another country with little more than a general sense of confidence things would work out.

So here I am. I'm in bed at my temporary hotel, having just got home from a night of drinking with my surprisingly international (and incredibly boozy) coworkers, after my third week at the company. Things have generally been pretty good.

I'm still working my way through a bunch of issues (currently trying to get Suncorp Bank to let me make a damn bank transfer), but after three weeks things are generally looking good. I am especially excited to move into my new apartment at the start of next month, so it will be nice to have a place to call home again.

There's no set plan for what I'm doing, but from here I am looking forward to making new friends, getting to know the city, and going even further in my free time to explore the rest of Europe.

To make things a little more fun I've been trying to keep a video blog. You can keep updated by subscribing on youtube if you're interested in that sort of thing.