British Politics

I've made it quite clear that I don't care much for American politics.  Well I care even less about British politics.  Even though I was in the UK for the election earlier this year, I would honestly struggle to name the current prime minister.  Such is my lack of interest and how quickly it has left my mind (and, as far as I'm aware, there has been zero post-election coverage in the US) .  Anyway, I was somewhat bemused to encounter some political graffiti on the way to the train station yesterday.  Some graffiti that I'm sure wasn't there a few days ago, and which they had already started to clean up.  And it might be the first anti-Labour government graffiti that I think I've ever seen.  I guess that shouldn't be a surprise when most of my time has been spent in the blue heartlands of Hertfordshire and Surrey.  This was pre-Budget, so I guess some rich toff was angry at possibly having to give up more of their inheritance to the government.   

Islington

Another London walk today, this one a 3+ mile trek through the north London suburb of Islington.  Somewhat as expected, this was by far the least photographic of the London walks I've done.  Not a total surprise, which is why I chose to do this walk on an overcast day.  I'm not sure if it was worth the expensive train ticket, but there was still some interesting history - not least following part of the New River Walk, which originates in my birth town of Hertford (and, coincidentally, I think I was in the New house at secondary school).  Otherwise, we are really talking a lot of inconspicuous Georgian terraces.  Note also that the walk finished near Emirates Stadium - home of my 2nd least favo(u)rite football club (behind only Man Utd), so this felt like a walk through enemy territory.

Return of the King

Less than one week until the US election.  And I am almost certain now that Donald Trump is going to win it.  I don't want it, I don't like it, but such is the will of the American people.  The moronic, deluded American people.  I won't dwell too much yet on what I think the next 4 years will be like (hint: not good).  However, I am currently doing quite a good job of avoiding most of the election news.  It is simply too depressing - the main reason also why my general current affairs intake is intentionally much lower (e.g. don't also get me started on US support of Israel).  I'd rather not deal with the reality of the outside world.  Sadly my future, as with almost every single other person in the world, is in some way impacted by something like the US election.  Which makes the stakes all the much higher, and the consequences all the more devastating.         

Wapping to Limehouse

What's this now - a London walk I haven't done before, even after all these years?  Yep, I did a walk that took me from Wapping to Limehouse - a distance of about 3.5 miles, though I took a lot of detours and diversions and ended up walking a lot more.  Basically I followed the Thames east from the Tower of London towards Canary Wharf.  This covered mainly old dockland area - most of which was either destroyed by the Blitz or closed in the 60's.  So what was left has mostly been redeveloped and modernized - making it perfectly pleasant but somewhat lacking in history and character compared to some of the other London walks.  Though I did pass a trio of 16th century pubs, which would make this a great walk to do with friends.

British Rail

A trip into London today - details and photos tomorrow.  Today, let me have a quick moan about British Rail.  Unfortunately this weekend, they were doing some engineering work and so there were rail replacement buses between Godalming and Guidlford.  Not a big deal I thought to myself, it might add a few minutes to the journey time but I can deal with that.  So I turn up at the station nice and early - in plenty of time for the scheduled train service at 8.15 am.  Things didn't look promising - no staff, not even any signs to indicate there is a bus replacement service.  But there were a few other people around, so just joined them waiting by the car park outside.  Then a small minibus showed up, but that was going in the opposite direction to Guildford.  I hope our bus will be bigger than that. 8.30 am.  No bus.  Mildly peeved.  8.45 am.  Still no bus.  Getting annoyed and impatient now.  9 am.  Still no bus.  Furious and frustrated now.  I'm not the only one.  Someone else waiting had contacted a helpline, and after initially being told it was delayed half an hour then they were told that they had no idea where the bus was.  Great.  And someone else mentioned that sometimes the bus was delayed, sometimes it showed up at the other side of the station to where everyone was waiting, and sometimes it never showed up at all.  9.15 am.  Finally, a bus - thank god.  Not our bus - this was a bus replacement for the 9.15 am train service.  Our one never showed up.  Absolutely disgraceful.  I note that South Western Railway offer "delay repay" if you're delayed by over 15 minutes.  I expect I shall apply for this.  And the kicker was that at Guildford, there were about 20 people in yellow bibs helping directing traffic and pointing people in the right direction for the rail replacement service.  I'd say of these 20 people, about 15 people were doing absolutely nothing.  How about actually relocating some of these people to help out customers at the impacted stations.  Really unimpressed - I will do my best to avoid travelling during engineering work in the future.     

British TV

Now I've had a few days to acclimatize, I'm reminded how terrible UK TV is.  Or, more accurately, how terrible UK terrestrial TV is.  Or, even more accurately, how terrible UK terrestrial TV is that I'm exposed to when I'm back.  I sometimes wonder whether I was adopted because my taste in TV is so wildly different to certain other family members.  But I guess it could also be a generational thing.  Take tonight - Strictly Come Dancing and The Voice are absolute trash and I couldn't stay in the same room to watch them.  I've currently got Gogglebox on in the background as I'm writing this.  I think it's an old episode, but at least it gives me an "insight" into the more buzzed about UK shows.  And absolutely nothing has screamed I must watch this yet.  It's clear now that the best shows are only on streaming services.  But maybe I also need to seek out recommendations of the few good UK shows I can find on iPlayer - for example, I know last time I was back I started watching Peaky Blinders.    

Mess

I'm normally a tidy person.  At times maybe even borderline OCD.  But how come when I stay in a hotel room, or a guest room like I am now, it is a total mess. Clothes strewn everywhere, making absolutely no use of the drawers and cupboards available to me, and no order to anything.  It is definitely a weird idiosyncrasy.   

Winkworth Arboretum

An extraordinarily expensive visit (at least for me, the non-National Trust member) to see some of the fall (autumn) colo(u)rs at Winkworth Arboretum.  I think maybe the spectacularness of the colo(u)rs are somewhat exaggerated, but it is a very pleasant place to go for a walk and the views are quite good. Sadly the crowds were out in force, what with the nice weather/half term/autumn colo(u)rs.  But I'd come back again.   

Arrival

I'm back in the UK.  An underwhelming flight - no upgrade, but the flight only seemed about half full so that came with it's own set of advantages: nobody in the seat next to me, never a wait for the toilet, no running out of meal choices, quick turnaround on boarding/leaving the plane.  Indeed, from leaving the plane it maybe took less than 15 minutes for me to walk to customs, get through the e-gate and pick up my (priority) baggage at Heathrow.  Very quick.  As always seems to be the case, I only get very fitful sleep on the flight - I had enough time to watch one film fully (The Fall Guy - cheesy), one film partially (Inside Out 2 - I guess I'll try to watch the rest of the film on the return flight) and just ran out of time on winning a game of monopoly against 3 computer players...   

Pre-Flight

An early entry today as my flight departs this evening.  Feels like I've, once again, over packed.  That's the problem with flying premium economy - you can check in 2 bags for free.  If it was just 1, I think I would be a lot more judicious with what I take.  However, I've already had to make one last minute wardrobe change.  I noticed that the jeans I was planning to wear on my flight have an unfortunate hole in the crotch area.  As if I didn't need any more motivation to buy new jeans.  Now I've just got to time the drive to the airport parking correctly.  I'm going to hit the rush hour traffic, which could add up to an hour to the driving time.  I wish Paine Field - the airport north of the city - did international flights.   

Forest 1-0 Palace

Oh dear, more dropped points and more relegation angst.  A terrible start to the season.  Makes the decision to sell one of our best defenders and one of our best attackers even more questionable.  Especially since the replacements brought in seem like a distinct step down in quality.  At what point do we change our manager?  I think the good will from the terrific end to last season has long dissipated now.  But personally I blame club ownership for showing a complete lack of ambition.  At least my general apathy to this season means that I'm a lot less invested in Palace's troubles.        

Political Ads

My god, I'm sick to death of all the political ads.  Even here in reliably left-leaning Washington State.  It's not just the presidential election, but all the state elections as well.  Up for grabs are a State Senate seat, all the Washington seats in the House of Representatives, Governor, and a load of other executive positions in the State.  And so every single ad break is almost guaranteed to include at least one of these state-level political ads.  And if not, then an ad for or against one of the various initiatives also appearing on the ballot.  It's endless.  And particularly depressing knowing that there is a good chance that America's cancer - Trump - is probably going to get elected again.  And everyone, not just in the US, should be scared of that.  It will be calamitous.

Clouds

I was just checking my phone, and forgot that I had taken a few photos on a Thursday afternoon stroll while momentarily escaping the office.  We'd just had a rainstorm come through in the morning, and so the cloud formations were quite dramatic - very Monet-like.  It's representative of the unstable weather we are currently experiencing - we had our first big blow of the season last night.  Briefly lost power, but the main consequence was the sheer amount of tree debris that came down everywhere.  Fortunately nothing big, yet, but it's left a big mess.

Jeans

Why has buying jeans suddenly become impossibly complicated for me?  I was looking for a specific brand, a specific style and a specific colo(u)r - to match another pair of jeans that I've currently got that I like - and it's impossible to find them.  I've been to various department stores and I either don't find the right colo(u)r or they don't have it in the right size.  I guess I could order a pair online, but I'm really struggling to match the colo(u)r on the website with the colo(ur) I want.  And in addition, I look at photos of the jeans and the label doesn't match the label on the pair I currently have.  Which is just confusing.  And now I've started second-guessing whether I even want to get a second similar pair, and maybe should instead go for something new - a different brand, a different style, not blue.  Maybe something recommended when I Google "best jeans for overweight men".  I need to revisit this after I come back from the UK - maybe in time for the Black Friday sales.       

Vaccinations

Well. I guess I'm ready for winter.  And ready for all the traveling I'm going to do before the end of the year!  I got both my COVID shot and flu shot this week.  I had to get them done in different arms because I got my COVID shot first, and whenever I get a COVID shot I always seem to have a sore arm around the injection site for at least a few days afterwards.  And this time was no exception.  Work offered the flu shot, but not the COVID shot - which I thought was a curious decision.    It might not matter - apparently so few people in the office signed up for the flu shot, that it's likely they won't offer it again in the future.

Fortune

I got a fortune cookie the other day which had the following fortune: "Be open to new opportunities in business".  Yet another sign that I'm going to get laid off.  And of course I'm obviously reading too much into this.

Passing Time

If I need a break from work, my current go-to diversion is timeguessr.com.  A variation on geoguessr, this one involves looking at historical photos and identifying the year and location.  It's interesting and challenging.  And recommended.   

More Trail cam Footage (but not much)

My trail cam did not capture very much over the last 3 weeks.  Lots of squirrel action, some rabbit action, and a few birds.  Disappointing.  I'm sure there is more wildlife out there - I might have to consider repositioning my camera if I continue not to capture the more interesting stuff (deer, coyote, raccoon, bobcat, possum, etc).  At least I hope we still have that wildlife - not particularly happy to find out today that my landlord has got a second cat.

Receipt

It's a bit disturbing when you do some grocery shopping, and you wonder why the receipt is so long when you've only bought a few items.  So you check the receipt, and it includes a number of recall notices.  These recall notices list a number of products that may be contaminated with LISTERIA MONOCYTOGENES (capitalized in the receipt for emphasis).  And if eaten, "could result in severe illness to those individuals who may consume this product".  And what is particularly disturbing is that it is very plausible that you have bought at least one of these products, and have already consumed it.  So it is absolutely stupid and pointless to state that you can return the product for a refund.  How about refunding me for the severe illness?  Which, admittedly, I have seemingly been very lucky to avoid.   

Haircut

I got my hair cut yesterday, and I'm not particularly happy with how it turned out.  I went to the barbers I normally go to - and I think this might be the last time.  The Vietnamese woman who cut my hair seemed to be in a hurry (even though there was nobody else waiting for a haircut) and have no attention to detail, and my hair just doesn't look right now. Or maybe I'm just imagining things.  I suspect it is as much the fault of my hairdresser's skills as it is my increasingly thinning hair.  And perhaps I need to get some proper advice on a hairstyle that might suit me now.  I'm thinking I should just go very short like I used to i.e. a buzz cut instead of the crew cut I think I've currently got.   

Aurora Bust

Was outside late last night in the hope of seeing the aurora - the forecast for aurora activity was high, and the skies were relatively cloudless.  Did I see anything?  Did I heck.  This was clearly nowhere near as good as it was that time earlier in the year.  Or perhaps I just happened to miss the peak time for activity.  I think it was the kind of event where you really needed to go somewhere with a much clearer view to the north.  Outside my house is not going to cut it, where the view is hindered by trees.  I did see some photos and videos of the lights taken in various locations in Washington (mainly to the north) - so perhaps I just needed to be more patient.  The aurora was also visible in the UK - and since I think all parts of the UK are further north than Seattle, the views were probably much better.     

Sunset

I made the most of the nice weather and went for a stroll around Lake Union whilst waiting for the evening rush hour to die down, so I could drive home from the office without being stuck in traffic for too long.  For a Thursday - by far the worst day of the week for traffic - it wasn't too bad today.  But I think I know the reason.  The Seattle Seahawks happened to be playing a Thursday night game (which they lost) - so I suspect more people than normal stayed at home or left early today.  Weirdly, there were also problems with accessing our garage so not many people were in the office today (thankfully including my annoying cube neighbo(u)r) - apparently the gate broke this morning, so people were either stuck and not able to get out, or not able to get in and had to find on-street parking nearby (either not easy or not cheap).  Fortunately I wasn't impacted, but that could easily have made what turned into a stressful day even worse.

Milton

Note to self - do not consider retiring to Florida.  In my old age, I do not want to have to deal with evacuating my home due to a hurricane.  Crazy.  When I think of Florida I think of hurricanes, alligators and Trump supporters.  Probably one of the most politically toxic places in the US - and not coincidentally one of the fastest growing states in the country (a large percentage of the people moving there are Trump-supporting crazies). 

Amazon Prime Day

I bought a cheap Chromebook in the Amazon Prime Day sales today.  Nothing flashy at all - it was less than $200 (plus sales tax).  But even at that price, I wonder if it was worth it.  It's normally only the low end electronics that get any sort of decent discounts in sales like this.  And although a few websites I checked did say this particular model was a good deal, it wasn't a necessity (I think the Chromebook I'm using right now still has a couple of years left before it "expires" - i.e. stops getting security updates).  Oh well, it's done now.  Yet another questionable purchase - something I should probably be more careful about if I get laid off.

Unseasonably Hot

Currently experiencing a bit of an Indian summer.  It was a very sunny day, and the temperatures got up to about 75 Fahrenheit today (which is about 24 Celsius).  Unfortunately at this time of year, hot days mean cold nights.  And I don't think this nice weather is going to last - the weather app has a mix of cloud, sun and rain in the forecast for the rest of the week, a typically unsettled autumnal forecast.  Unfortunately, didn't make the most of the weather - got preoccupied with work.  It turned into one of those days where I seemed to work quite hard but didn't actually get anything done.  Frustrating.         

Downtown Seattle

I haven't been to downtown Seattle for a while now - especially not the "revitalized" waterfront.  But I'd like to check it out one of these weekends - maybe I can even park at one of the transit stations and take the light rail there.  This weekend Overlook Walk opened - a park that connects the waterfront with downtown - a project that cost $70 million.  Even though the waterfront was already connected to downtown - but I assume this new construction makes it a bit easier to get between the two.  But I suspect even all that money won't fix all the problems downtown - like the homelessness and open drug use.

Dumb

I can't recall the expression for just learning something new that everyone else probably already knows, but I had that occur to me today.  I was washing my car, and I realized that I had a couple of exterior lights on the front of my car that I didn't know what they were for.  They were below the main headlights, and I don't think I'd ever seen them on.  Do they even work?  Well after playing around with the different lighting settings from the driver's seat, and then realizing that didn't work when the engine wasn't switched on, I discovered that these lights did indeed work and that they are the fog lights.  D'uh.  I always thought the fog light was an extra bright red light on the rear of a car - it never crossed my mind that it could be extra lights on the front of a car.  If visibility is poor, I would only think of using high beams.  So I guessed I learnt something new today.  And I feel quite stupid.      

Random Song

I don't know how the YouTube algorithm works, but a band recently popped up in my YouTube recommendations that I haven't thought about for decades.  Even despite the fact that I own 2 of their albums - or at least I think I do, it's been so long since I checked my CD collection.  I really need to digitize it.  But yes, listening to a few songs from this band I am reminded that they were pretty good and why I liked them so much.  And apparently they are still touring.

Chick-fil-A

My current favo(u)rite fast food restaurant is Chick-fil-A.  They definitely do some of the best chicken sandwiches out there.  But they are not without controversy.  They are one of those American companies whose values are strongly influenced by Christian religious beliefs.  Such as not being open on Sundays, and not supporting same-sex marriage.  But despite this, they remain unerringly popular and are something like the third biggest fast-food chain in the US.  With this in mind, I was curious whether they had a presence in the UK.  According to Wikipedia, they did have a few stores open about 5 years ago but none of them lasted and apparently were quite heavily protested against due to their anti-LGBTQ stance.  But it seems like they are going to try again to break into the UK market and are opening 5 locations across the UK next year.  For a chain this big, I'd be surprised if they don't eventually have a strong UK presence - not unlike other US chains like Taco Bell or Five Guys.          

Sunset

I sometimes really wish I lived somewhere with a view.  I do like a good vista and a good sunset.  This was the sky yesterday evening.  And where did I snap this photo?  From the grocery store car park, as I stopped to pick up a few things on the way home from work.

Big Bucks

An expensive day, as I bought a new suit this morning.  I didn't have a budget, so I probably overpaid for something I'm probably not going to wear very much.  Beyond funerals, weddings, job interviews (which may soon become quite pertinent) and company parties with a formal dress code (which I haven't been to for several years) - I doubt it's going to get much use.  But at least the suit should fit me and should last, and I think looks good - which is more than can be said for my first and only previous suit.