Weeknote 22/2024
Imagine one of those old-school snowglobes. You know, the ones you shake and the resulting intense snowstorm settles over a twee scene. Now imagine that happening inside your head six times over the last couple of weeks, coupled with intense aversion to screens and other people.
Yeah, it hasn’t been fun. I’ve only had migraines this bad once or twice before in my life, and in both cases I was extremely stressed from work. Go, as they say, figure ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯
On Friday night, we watched the England Lionesses’ game vs France at St James Park, Newcastle. I took the above photo 1.5 hours before kick-off, because my wife insists on getting to this kind of thing super-early. Once everyone filed in, it was a great atmosphere and almost sold-out.
It was a shame they lost 2-1 after throwing away an early lead. I semi-seriously think our 13 year-old daughter with her 60+ goals this season could have finished some of the chances spurned by the England forwards. Who knows, maybe one day she’ll get the chance to prove me right.
This evening we’re back at St James Park for our son’s club’s awards ceremony. His current team is disbanding, but he has one more year of junior football left (U18) so he’s joining a local team. I think that’s a good decision because, although he can definitely ‘body’ me off the ball easily, men’s football can be pretty brutal. Plus, he gets to play with his mates before (probably) heading off to university next year.
Guess what? We’ll be at St James Park again on Monday night for the England men’s game vs Bosnia & Herzegovina. Unlike the women’s game, which was a Euros qualifier, this one is a friendly. Still, it will be good to see them in action.
With Monday being a Bank Holiday, Thursday being a complete wipeout due to the worst of my migraines, and my our two being on half-term, I haven’t done much actual paid work. In any case, WAO hasn’t got that much on other than our collaboration with MIT DCC. I did manage to get study done for my MSc in Systems Thinking by going over to my parents’ house on Friday morning, but I’m still behind so have already asked for an extension to my first assessment.
The thing which is absolutely doing my head in at the moment is having my temporary home office in the utility room of our new place. It’s between the kitchen and garage, and the washing machine, tumble dryer, and fridge/freezer is in here. Cue family members just popping in to get something to the fridge, or putting their head round the door while getting something to eat/drink.
There’s still lots of things to get done to this house. The painting is largely done, although the perfectionist in me wants to white gloss all of the skirting boards and radiators. We’ve moved on to getting venetian blinds for the windows at the front to replace the pull-down ones which aren’t much use.
After that, we need to prioritise a bunch of things including extending at the back to create a new kitchen which could include my office. But equally we could convert part of the garage, extend over the garage, or invest in a garden pod. The latter may or not be a good idea given the amount of clay in our back garden; I don’t want to come back into the house like I took a detour via the Battle of the Somme.
Next weekend, my wife and daughter are heading to Barcelona for a football tournament. My son and I aren’t going because we didn’t know the dates of his exams at the time when the flights and accommodation needed to be booked. In the event, he’s actually already finished his exams, but we can do our own thing while they’re away. I definitely want to go and see Furiosa if it’s still showing at the cinema.
In a parallel universe, I’d be going to the PublicSpaces conference in Amsterdam, watching my daughter’s team in Barcelona, and then heading back to Amsterdam for MozFest House. Ah well.
