books
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📷 What. A. Saturday. Salt nativity scenes. Craft beer. Good food. Long day, but a very fun one. Back to the in-laws for a birthday party (got there late, of course), a short night, and the drive back to the city. tinyMovieStar still had her temperature a little higher than she should. Damn, Winter!
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🤒 The week started (on Monday, as they do) with the little one still battling her fever, and cough. Waking up much later than usual, and staying at home with us. That meant movieStar couldn’t work normally, as I was running around town doing errands. movieStar’s passport was picked up, with no delays. We got to Wednesday with the little one still a bit sick, temperature down again, but not to normal level.
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👩🏻⚕️ We did go to a doctor, on Wednesday. The cough became too much, tinyMovieStar threw up her lunch, and we made a last minute appointment. Busy day for the doctor, so we had to wait hours before we could see her. In the end it was a throat infection, some crazy virus to blame. Medication, and she should be fine. We ended up sleeping at my in-laws, while movieStar had the big bed at home all to herself.
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🇹🇷 We’ll make it! Tomorrow we’ll fly to Istanbul, hopefully. This one was published a bit early, as I’m not sure how/when/if I’ll be able to write that much in the coming days, but I would love to get a special, Turkey themed, edition out when we’re back.
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🤣 Tik Tok has SO MUCH stuff! So far I’m happy to have found socially inept in there, among other things. As someone pointed out, some/most of the videos are available as Reels on Instagram as well. But not all, not by a long shot. And navigation on Tik Tok is much nicer, as well as the discovery. Search/suggestions seem to work a lot better too. Music, movie clips, comedy, tv,… Everything is in there!
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📺 TV has been replaced with Tik Tok this week.
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🍿 Movies have been replaced with Tik Tok this week.
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🎙 Podcasts have been replaced with Tik Tok this week.
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📚 Books have been replaced with Tik Tok this week.
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📬 Back to trying Mailbrew. It still works, and it’s still a good way to get an automatic newsletter out without a lot of hassle. Must look into this a bit more, after we get back.
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📦 Arq Backup. Do I need this? On one hand, my laptop is so old that a failure might actually happen. On the other hand most of the important stuff has a backup already, iCloud is taking care of that. The cost is not too high, though, so…
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🎉 We enjoyed part II of the movieStar Birthday Extravaganza. Family, friends, pets, all gathered around the fireplace, in the living room, dining room, kitchen, and outside. There was a lot of people and, easy to guess, a lot of food and drinks as well. By the end of it she was exhausted, and couldn’t wait for it all to end. It was not easy, considering we went out a bit later the night before. We are not getting any younger, that is so easy to see. These late nights are harder to come back from.
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🎄 We also got a xMas tree. A fake one. First one we ever got. I’m now researching easy-to-make decorations, so we can do those at home, and hang them side by side with the normal, store bought, ones. We started working on the tree on Friday, with a friend tinyMovieStar loves. She asked for her, specifically, for this matter. We all picked her up from kindergarten, slowly made our way home, assembled the tree, had dinner, and she had to go. We were left behind with a crying toddler. She is in full Drama Queen Mode, poor thing. We had to ask Diana (our friend) to drive by our place the following morning, after swimming class, so the little one could see her for a moment. She did.
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🥰 tinyMovieStar had a cool Monday, and a crazy week (see previous point). The little one was exhausted after a weekend of partying, and a little cold. She needed the rest, so we let her sleep in on Monday morning, skipping the morning part of kindergarten duty. She joined the kids for lunch, like a boss! A nap followed that, and I picked her up soon after, and piggyback-ed her to ballet class. Pizza for dinner, to end this fun filled day! On Thursday, she woke up in a very strange mood. She’s usually a very relaxed, smiling, happy, kid but was furious on Thursday. Not sick but, as Alex and Luke suggested, probably just some growing pains. She was ok a couple of hours later. Still felt very powerless, unable to make her feel better.
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🍺 Managed to meet my best friend for a couple of beers this week. That was it as far as my social
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🇹🇷 Trip update time, although I’ve been updating throughout the week pretty often, sorry about that.. We thought about it for a long while, and decided to go ahead and not skip the Jordan part of our upcoming trip. We’re going to Jordan! Tickets were purchased. Then, came Tuesday evening, movieStar said we needed to make a decision regarding travel in the country, as we only had a short window in Jordan (we tried to cram a lot into a week). I double checked the reservation email, and it was not pretty. We had screwed up the flight times. We would fly into Jordan very late on a day, spend two days, and leave as the day turned. That would make the whole thing crazy, as we wouldn’t even have time to properly visit Petra. Barely doable for both of us, but we don’t feel like dragging Clara behind us, running around like mad men. She would not love it for sure, and we would feel the same, with guilt on top. We’re not going to Jordan! Lucky us, one of the legs was rescheduled, and we were able to request a refund! Turkey it is, Jordan is out. We then proceeded to add Cappadocia to the itinerary. How’s that for ups and downs?
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👋🏼 One of the things that I enjoy when using a new service, any new service, is digging through the feature set, the FAQ, the manuals. Finding out what I could use it for, best ways to go about it, and new things I might have missed entirely. Where am I getting this fix this week? HEY. Setting up things just the way I like it is a big part of the fun. I’ll try to keep these HEY updates to a minimum, but still having fun. Particularly on the web version, the extensive keyboard shortcut support is very nice, makes navigating the whole thing as easy as can be. Love the fact that the actual key is discreetly placed next to the action. Didn’t remember this detail, but it’s great for this part of the process, while my brain is still getting used to the new shortcuts. Also, enjoying the stickies, and that’s something I didn’t think I would.
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🌹 Still on HEY, I feared the worst, when the time came to send an email to 144 parents at kindergarten, as part of my duties in the group that is setting things up for the Christmas event. I got a message saying that my account had limitations for the two first months, something that is not written anywhere. I was annoyed, considered asking for a full refund, again, but instead sent another mail to their support team. A few (lot) of hours later, the limitations were lifted, and I was able to proceed. Christmas surprise is ON. Support came through, it was a very welcome surprise, they now have some karma points in my book.
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📺 The Billionaire, The Butler, and the Boyfriend. Three episodes only, so that was quick to watch. Incredible story.
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🍿 Tried to watch Focus, but couldn’t. It promised fun, but I found it very boring. Old Dads was the second one I gave up on, and rather quickly as well.
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🎙️ Podcasts took a back seat this week. Other than the nightly listen, my sleeping pill routine, I didn’t get to a lot of them this week. Ruminate 173 - Should This Be a Blog Post?, Abstract Development #56 - Oh, I forgot to mention tinylytics.
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🎵 Thanks to Jack, I listened to Andre 3000’s new album. Flute. Cool flute.
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📚 Added a few books to my list, well aware I haven’t read a single line (in a book) in over two weeks. Should change that.
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💸 I subscribed to Kagi’s Starter plan, the yearly subscription. My 300 monthly searches were gone after 3 weeks, and I did not have a way out. Couldn’t pay for an extra package. It was either upgrade to the unlimited, $10 a month, tier, or get this one for half that. I’m aware the allowed 3600 searches won’t last a whole year, curious to see how far I can stretch them. On their Discord the announced a new mail service is being developed, and also they’ll start charging VAT. Darn. Paying for search is not something I did without seriously considering the cost, and adding 23% on top of that will probably mean I’ll skip it after I’m done with this year. I figured the starter plan will not be enough, and I can’t really afford the unlimited plan, with VAT on top of it. There are much better ways to spend that kind of money.
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🌧️ Weather is finally catching up with the calendar, and the rain is here. Not perfect when one has to work outdoors, but… In a week we got hit by Babet, Aline, and Bernard. Ouch.
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📷 After a big resting period, we went back to a vineyard, and got some photos/videos for the shop I shoot for once in a while. Of course the night before had to be a rough one, so I was in a very good mood waking up. A couple of coffees later, I was on my way to the meeting point, got on the Tesla bus, and we drove to the Alentejo, far far away from the city. Spent a few hours with a Danish-American-Portuguese girl who’s running a vineyard, had lunch, drove back to the city. The mandatory battery charging stops are a pain, as they add hours to an already long day. When I’m lucky, I get some photos. Added, fun, bonus: on the way back we drove by David, and he spotted me. I did not, as I was texting him. Kids, get off your phones!
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🌧️ Thursday was an odd day. I had a meeting, and that was postponed for weather-related issues. I did mostly nothing. Had to send a receipt, did that. Not much else. Spent a while thinking about the sweetest hug my adorable daughter gave me the day before at dinner time. Found a theme for Kagi I kinda like. Watched the news. Waited for the time to pick the little one up.
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🧰 Thursday’s meeting ended up happening on Friday. A work meeting, a friend needs help with her store’s social media, and website. I might be able to help. Not sure if I really want to get into this, but would like to try. I feel my skill set is almost up to this, so… Let’s see how things progress. This would be a big change of pace for me, a non-photo related job. Putting all the hours I have spent at the computer to work, whenever I have no actual photos to do.
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🍰 The weekend came, and the whole family got together for dinner, on movieStar’s side. Both brothers, their wives, Mom&Dad. Auntie joined us. It was a blast. And SO much food, again. Next week Auntie’s son is joining us, just back from Japan. Her kids as well, So tinyMovieStar will have her cousins to play with, and not only her uncles. We could also get back to Saturday lunch with my parents, as my mom is by now fully recovered from the cataract surgery. Every weekend is a party!
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🥰 tinyMovieStar keeps on being awesome, and being a Papi is still my favorite part of the week, every single week. She’s now enjoying her swimming lessons a lot more, but not even close to how much she loves her ballet ones. She’s doing great at school too. We’re still the ones who pick her up earlier, and most of the time we both manage to do it. We’re at home, working on something, counting the minutes until we can go. We just love having her around, she’s great company. She has an imaginary friend, for a while now, and I should have mentioned him before. He’s the most imaginative imaginary friend imaginable, of course: his name is Jovedine (I have never heard of this time), and he comes from Guiné Bissau (of course, why wouldn’t he?). He has a severe disability on one of his legs, and he limps, and he’s missing an eye. He needs a bandage change every day. He has traveled the world with tinyMovieStar (Myanmar, Vietnam, Russia, …), sometimes as a friend, others as a husband, or even son. From time to time she’ll show us how he walks, and she’ll limp about, one hand covering her eye. She’s crazy. I love her.
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📺 Still on the Patriot train. Still odd, still enjoying it. Finished season one, taking a small break before season two. The Juul story is on pause, I was getting serious “I need a smoke” vibes from watching it. We tried an episode of the new Lupin season, but were so tired, we gave up. Not sure we’ll make it through this one.
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📚 Haven’t updated lately on what I’m reading because, well, I’m not reading a lot. Whenever I have some free time, I’ll just check the news, or Feedbin. That’s it. Books are “open”, on the app, but I’m afraid only a couple of pages at a time are read. Still, these are the ones I’m trying to go through: The Last Resort - Sarah Stodola, Please Scream Inside Your Heart - Dave Pell, Unreasonable Behavior - Don McCullin, Three Assassins - Kotaro Isaka, How to Avoid Being Killer in a War Zone - Rosie Garthwait. I’m putting it out there, maybe that’ll force me to get back to them. Also, I have been looking at Kobo, maybe I need a new ebook reader, now that movieStar seems to have kept mine forever. Reading on the phone is only possible if I turn on the sleep focus mode, where all notifications are off.
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👀 Gaby started it, and I tried it: shooting b&w for a while. He promised a month, I lasted a couple of hours on the first try. One photo, a single one, and then I was back to colour. Gave it another go. It doesn’t come easy for me. And I kinda cheated as well, as I posted a LOT of photos in between, photos from the archive, colorful ones.
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🕵️♂️ Kagi, Kagi, Kagi. It’s been going on for a couple of weeks now, I kept seeing the engine mentioned everywhere I look. And I’ve been doing what I’ve read some others did as well, carefully wondering if I should use Kagi for a specific search, saving those precious trial searches, not getting into it as I should for a proper test. So, I transferred $10, and am now ready to give it a go. By Wednesday my free trial had ended, and the first $5 were used for a month of Starter plan. I might need over 300 searches a month, but not ready to pay $10/month for a search engine just yet. I’m happy with Kagi. Not sure if pay-for-me happy, but really happy. Since I turned it into my default search engine, and stop caring if every search was worth spending one search token on it, I have been using it everywhere, and I’m really happy with the results I get. Usually there’s not a lot of scrolling when I search, as the thing I’m looking for is at the top of the list. I guess that means it’s a good search engine, right? The summarize function is pretty cool as well.
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🔩 Adding a button to a site shouldn’t be that hard, but this particular one did take a while to figure out. Thankfully Sara came to the rescue, as I was about to give up. CSS can be SO tricky! Anyway, you can now find a “Reply on Mastodon” under every post on the blog. Of course someone took it upon themselves to create a plugin minutes after the whole thing was finally done (thanks, Otávio), so now everyone can add the same feature, with a lot less trouble. The community part of both Micro.blog and Mastodon (social.lol in particular) keeps on being awesome. Happy to be a part of these two.
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📥 On Drafts… Greg posted about Drafts Web Capture, and this is even better than Mail to Drafts, a feature I mentioned last week. Thank you, I am now using it often, whenever I’m using my Mint install.
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🏦 I’d been avoiding the trip to the bank for well over a month. I hate going to the bank. Hate it. So, when the gentleman on the other side of the telephone call (also something I dislike) said I would have to go in, in person, I was not pleased. I needed to show up with documentation, as the ones they had on file had expired a (very long) while back. Anyway, came back from this first try almost empty-handed. Documentation was updated, now on to the rest of the issue… It was only half a week later that things started moving again. I have no idea how banks still get away with “x business days” type stuff. Things happen instantly now! Anyway, the ball was rolling, and it led, in the end, to the most wonderful surprise, and solution: my dad decided to end this whole shitty bank nonsense, and offered to pay what was left of the mortgage! We went, again, and got the ball rolling. It will roll into next month, when everything will be behind us. Can’t wait.
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🤽🏻♀️ Last weekend was, as normal, spent at the in-laws. We had the usual normal time, enhanced a bit by the portable pool for the kids, and a visit from a couple of young cousins. Company for tinyMovieStar. Happy kids, happy parents.
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📷 Work wise, not a lot to say. Or, better, nothing to say. I had no work at all this week.
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📺 The Righteous Gemstones Season 2 went by, and the 3rd season has begun in this household. It sometimes gets a little crazy, but still watching it. Smartless: On the Road. Meh so far. Episode 1, but it’s taking me forever to finish it, and that’s not a nice sign. We’re still doing The Diplomat, whenever movieStar has time for it.
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📚 Books were returned to the library. tinyMovieStar did not fully understand the whole concept of the library. So, before I return them, I went and bought the favourite of the bunch. We now have the Pink Monster book as well. tinyMovieStar wanted to come to the library with me, but we kept postponing this one. We did it so much that I had to walk there alone in the end.
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🎁 While at it, I got something for movieStar as well, and she liked it. And a new case for my iPhone, and a new hip pack to go with it. So, everyone got something. Yay. I’m now rocking a Chalk Pink case. Like it.
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🥺 And, to finish this one off, something that is happening later today, and tomorrow. I don’t usually talk about the future, but this is a big one. movieStar is going to a birthday party today, and another event tomorrow, and we’re not going. This is completely out of the ordinary, and I’m looking forward to tinyMovieStar’s reaction. We’re driving to my in-laws, cousins are coming over tomorrow, but… no mom.
Started reading: Rise and Kill First by Ronen Bergman 📚
Got this yesterday evening, and couldn’t put it down until well past 1AM. Looking forward to a few more pages today.
📚 I was missing something, woke up a few minutes earlier to take care of it.
thingsThisWeek #77
Final preparations for TurkeyTour, editing a lot of photos so we could leave without a worry (didn’t make it to the end), taking care of last minute purchases. tinyMovieStar sick for a few days. Busy week, all things considered. Not a lot going on, and still a lot going on, if that makes any sense.
thingsThisWeek #75
📚 Ordered volume 1 of The Way of the Househusband (極主夫道) from Vinted. I wanted one of these in print for a while, and the price was just too low to skip it.
thingsThisWeek #71
Work, meetings, weather, family, web stuff. What one would call a very normal week. A good one. Plenty to write about too.
📚 End of Day. Yesterday.
thingsThisWeek #54
📚 Maybe we can return the books to the library today!
📚 The PJ Party was great. And I do love a good library.
