A woman in the supermarket. Two daughters and a trolley. “Go away. I’m tired of the complaining. Just go away somewhere and leave me alone.” The daughters stay. So does the trolley.

The 6th of January is Festa de la Befana. All over Italy, kids will be waking up to socks full of lollies! And it’s a public holiday :)

I’m setting up a stall at Manly Village Public School Markets on January 21 to try to sell some books. I’m also going hoping to record visitors reading lines from one of the books (with their permission). I want to create an audio version where lines are read by different, unrelated voices, mainly because I think it would be fun. And another audio project to muck around with.

@danielpunkass Posting this from MarsEdit to see if the mention link is working now :)

Sydney this morning is cold, wet and windswept, like a Winter’s day in 1965.

Season 2 of Bäckström ended with the Linda mystery unresolved, which was frustrating. Apparently there’s still a chance for a Season 3, so maybe then. 📺

After The Troubling Affair of the Carrots, Episode 1, in which my Aldi carrots emerged from the bag rotting from the base up (all soft and squishy-crumbly), I took my business to The Big Fruit Shop instead. My new fruit shop carrots looked perfect when I put them in the fridge, but the following day when I opened the bag they were covered in spots of mould.

What is happening to the vegetables of Sydney? Because it isn’t just the carrots. The Troubling Affair of the Carrots, Episode 1 had become The Troubling Affair of the Beans as well, when my just-purchased refrigerated greens began exuding a slimy, off-white substance resembling pus.

Not appetising. Not at all.

I’ve just watched the first tutorial in the video series This is Reaper 6, by Kenny Gioia. So impressed! Here is someone who really knows how to make a video tutorial! He doesn’t rush, he isn’t condescending, he assumes zero knowledge on the part of his viewers (totally correct in my case), and he doesn’t overload the brain (thankfully, because mine overloads easily these days).

I’m interested in audio production. Not music, so much, but spoken voice and ambient sounds, and I want to know how to capture these and present them as well as I can. Maybe do a podcast one day. 🎧

Now, on to Video 2 :)

Sydney this morning: cloudless sky and high humidity. And very, very quiet.

Oh my! I’ve changed the theme of my blog to Cards, truncated longer posts on the home page (thank you for your help, @jsonbecker) and added a footer with links in a horizontal list.

I can add a search box but I cannot style it for love or money, so I’ve removed it, pending further research.

These small achievements have taken me the entire first day of 2023 and may well occupy the second as well, but by the end of tomorrow I hope to have a blog that I can just post to without thinking about form. And then I might actually post.

This post is an act of defiance. Take that, cruel world!

Hyper Plan v2.10 Planning Software:

Visualize your plans your way

I had a look at this software from the Winterfest sale, worked through the Quick Start Guide, and decided I don’t need another app to manage the tasks that roam through my head. I’d like to be able to use it, but my brain says no.

I’ve downloaded MarsEdit 5 to try the app again after a long interlude.

I met a Basenji just now. A gorgeous little dog, four months old and with permanent frown lines already 🙂🐶

Yesterday I found such an interesting market stall in Manly selling the Mathematicalendar. There’s even a US version, for those who like their dates round the wrong way :) The website is worth a look if you love Maths. Even moreso if you don’t.

I’m rediscovering the wonderful micro.blog and I’m amazed at what you can do with it.

NetNewsWire: Feedle: Blog Search with RSS Feeds

How on earth does anyone even get a Panther tank into their basement?

BBC story - German lawyers wrangle over pensioner’s WW2 tank in basement

There’s a log in a bog in a fog
And a dog on the log in the bog
And a frog in the bog
That’s agog at the dog
On the log in the bog in the fog

New York

The dog was sick
the cat was sad
the budgie wouldn’t talk …
The chook was dead
the cocky said
they didn’t like New York.

It’s a local but physical law,
That in England, if one is outdoor,
And an object is downed,
It will never hit ground,
But is certain to land on the floor.

Question: if I wanted to quote short snippets of popular songs, as posts in their own right, should I include a reference to the songwriter or lyricist?

For example:

Long time ago
Life had begun
Everyone went to the sun

This is from Everyone’s Gone to the Moon, 1965, by Jonathan King. I never actually registered who’d recorded it. The song was just part of the musical background of my early life, and these words have stuck with me. From my current perspective, of course, they’re quite poignant.

It feels like the words can stand on their own, because in my mind they’ve done that for all these decades, and anyone of my vintage would recognise them.

But I suspect a formal attribution is always required … ?

The Talking Derry Girls Podcast: Episode 21

Talking Derry Girls, masters of tech,
Going non-instrumental a sec,
Bring a Derry lad’s voice
To their anthem of choice,
With the tea level touching his neck.

The Talking Derry Girls Podcast: Episode 20

The sedentary sirens of yearning
Were deadly in Derry, we’re learning;
Their cover was blown,
And the the Foyle would be known
As the River of Never Returning.

The Talking Derry Girls Podcast: Episode 19

Little Acorns, the story untold,
The shop that came out in the cold;
A brown paper drop
And a bus at the stop …
It’s a genre that never gets old.