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Saturday, February 29, 2020

weird week

i'm not sure where to begin, so this will be a jumble.

last night i was keeping an eye on the kids at the temple, and witnessed nasty little boy throw something suspicious at mr smear's head and hurt him. i found it... a thick metal washer. jesus. i'm pretty sure my response left an impression, but it's really disturbing that this is the second time i've witnessed him taking cruel suggestions from older boys and his mom seems a bit... disconnected. or despairing. it's hard to tell.

this morning was a memorial service for my mom's brother, and gd - in spite of her misgivings regarding the orthodox separation of men and women - came along and seemed to have a positive experience. our lunch at bobo's was good, but not so incredible as to justify the price. it was great spending time with gd's friends, not so great hearing that 2020 hasn't been particularly kind to them so far.

we have stuffed ourselves on a variety of delicious breads today.

swimming would have been nice but it was a bit cold. i suspect tattoo season is on its way.

i worked out of the gym two days this week, i finally picked up a decent headset.

having my life insurance broker and potential broker trying really hard to keep / get my business is a pain in the ass. the doctor's visit was entertaining, though:
"did anyone ever name your syncope?"
"you mean, like 'bob'?"

aligning people on good git practices and manipulating git repos is really good for my ocd.

gd's first bat mitzvah lesson was this week, she managed to resolve an issue with someone we had a fight with years ago who didn't realize that *she* was the one making things uncomfortable. this in conjunction with last week's playdate with the class bully and gd telling his mom exactly what she thought made for a good week.

i've been really tired this past week, and going to bed pretty damned early. i've also accepted that i'm out of shape, can't exercise, and am likely to be like this (slightly overweight, feeling on the weak side with a bum knee) for a long while to come. it's okay. so i'm getting older. i'm mostly good.

poetry. i'm finding it hard to record my poetry. i have three pieces i want to put out there and i need the time / space / energy to do it. it's playing on me.

gd and mr smear went to check out the school i was so excited about last year, and now they're both excited about it too. win!

Monday, February 24, 2020

tired

it's been a weird weekend. i've been tired and grumpy for most of it. i feel like i'm not getting shit done. i feel like i don't have time for me, even when i do but i'm not using it constructively.

friday was a bit of a downer, i worked from the gym and i just couldn't get my head right. the new children's service at the temple was brilliant, and it set a really good vibe for the regular service.

i struggled with saturday morning, both being tired and not as well-prepared for the torah reading as i'd hoped to be. it was a pleasant morning nonetheless. i came home to swap with gd as she went off to a birthday party, mr smear and i had a pretty good afternoon together.

this morning gd went off to her monthly hypnotherapy course and i took mr smear to a birthday party. it wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great either. and the freaking snake dude, man - jesus, you'd think the parents would have warned us that they'd brought someone in to do a goddamned reptile show. we're trying to teach our kid compassion for animals, there i am at a birthday party explaining to my four year old why it's not cool to be imprisoning snakes and then passing them around to be handled by screaming children.

my mom picked us up, she didn't hang around for long but she and mr smear shared some sweet moments. by the time gd got back home it was late afternoon and i was desperately in need of a nap, but i'd had coffee to cope with keeping mr smear entertained and so i just lay in bed feeling like crap.

the evening was fun, though, after we got back from the jungle gym we introduced mr smear to TNMT (both the original and the 2003 series), mr smear totally beat me in a memory card game and shower and bedtime was pretty chilled. then gd and i watched most of dogma, and it's now past midnight and i'm going to be a wreck in the morning.

Thursday, February 20, 2020

1 step up, 1 step down

i'm in a weird space this evening, not actually sure how i feel and my mind's all over the place.

today:

feeling much better this morning, the pushy financial consultant arriving at our door (the security guard failed completely) just as  i was rushing mr smear out to meet my mom and drop him off at school. afterwards we grabbed coffee and tea and then i got a ride to protoplasm's new workspace to drop off his birthday present, we had a good chat and then i went to work.

work was pretty darned satisfying. i closed the day by delivering the work i was originally tasked with, and now i'm on to the next mission. and my briyani lunch was fantastic.

i came home too late to swim, had a bit of a mixed-feelings evening.

yesterday:

a tough and tedious workday. coming home late from a very pleasant post-work barbecue after mr smear had already fallen asleep, trying to get to bed early but still awake until at least midnight

tuesday:

the last part of the day was baffling and gave me a headache, and then after i left i learned that i was late because gd was going to a talk. after getting mr smear to bed early after a pleasant evening, i completed a writing assignment in a completely different way from what i'd planned and i was really happy with it.

monday:

i was still awfully tired on monday, and only started coming right this morning.

now it's late again and i haven't done the one thing i was supposed to be doing for the past couple of hours. not good.

Sunday, February 16, 2020

sunday

so. that was a day.

i tightened up the base functionality of my new app, after which we went to the waterfront to take care of some chores. between opening a service query for gd's phone number, purchasing a mini-ups for our modem, lunch, some playtime for mr smear, gift shopping, handling phone insurance, a pharmacy visit and a couple of toilet runs, we ended up WAY over time and late and our cousin arrived at our front door for a visit while gd was still in the queue at the grocery store.

no stress. fortunately, my mother was able to help out which was amazing, and the afternoon with the two cousins who came over was very well spent.

we finished watching the thundercats reboot, which overall - aside from a couple of uncharacteristically lazy deus ex machinas - was superb and fun for the whole family.

gd's obsession with the 5 differences online game has become infectious.

one, two, skip a few...

wednesday & thursday:

a blur of work, very interesting architecture discussions and right now i don't recall much anything that happened at home except that i was practicing for yesterday's torah reading and time just felt like it was slipping away. and while i can't recall specifics, this whole week has been filled with feeling very proud of mr smear and having quite a lot of fun with him. oh! it's been really cool reading him the jungle book as well as stories and poems by miriam yelen shtekalis.

friday:

it was a slow start to the day, i worked out of the gym and while i remembered to take a sweater i managed to leave it at the door. it was freaking COLD. halfway through the day, though, i realized that i can (and should) take my swimming trunks with me whenever i go, and just jump in the jacuzzi a couple of times a day! and take a sweater.

i finally completed my first task (pending integration testing) and spent a good chunk of the workday fiddling with git branches. note to the world: setting up sourcetree and meld on a mac makes an enormous difference to resolving merge conflicts!

yesterday:

my neck's really started hurting again.

i got to the temple a little less late than last week, the first part of the service was nice but then someone sat down near me (not sure which of the someones it was) who smelled like perfumed BO, it was a struggle not to gag and i had to move away. after the torah was taken out i sat down thinking "i have some time to go over my verses", not realizing that the rabbi had assigned me the morning's opening verses and when he called me my heart started pounding in my chest, throat and temples. stage fright again. so i started reading, and then something seemed to happen to my eyes and it became difficult to make out the words.

it was only after the barmitzvah that i learned the reason: the torah scroll we were reading out of is actually a holocaust survivor; it was stolen from a synagogue in czechoslovakia, and after world war ii was sent to london, fixed up about twenty years later and then made its way to cape town. so that's a thing.

i came home intending to rest a bit, other stuff happened and then eventually we all went down to the pool for a really nice hour or two. between the pre-pool and us leaving for protoplasm's 40th birthday party, i managed to make some good progress on an app i've been building for the last couple of weeks and i'm really happy with it so far!

my mom came over to deliver a few new superhero books for mr smear and babysit, we went out to the birthday party and had a lot of fun! we ended up having to leave in a hurry around midnight, but not after meeting some very interesting people and possibly making a fantastic connection for the sonnetcomix project!

this morning:

mr smear woke up around 4am from a nightmare, and wouldn't go back to sleep so i stayed with him for a couple of sleepless hours. load-shedding kicked off at 6am, at which point i learned that the UPS i've hooked the modem up to isn't working at all. as it was light, i moved back to my bed and let gd handle mr smear and his new beloved collection of books, waking up a couple of hours later to find the two of them passed out on the other side of the bed with the books stacked neatly next to them.

Wednesday, February 12, 2020

tuesday

i felt better this morning, it might be because i slept more. so of course, i'm going to bed later tonight...

it was a solid day grinding, with a couple of strategy discussions, and i feel good about what i achieved. and then i took on more torah reading for the coming weekend, and then had a haircut, and came home. it turns out mr smear has figured out counting in / multiplying by tens. how?! when?!

i don't even know what i've been doing this evening, to be honest. i had plans. i think.

Monday, February 10, 2020

mondaze

yesterday:

a little bit of book promotion, picking up a UPS (loadshedding's here to stay, at least we'll have internet access), and representing my family at the tu b'shvat seder (mr smear's still sick, he can't return to school until wednesday) 

today:

rushing out of bed groggy, life insurance forms before work, arriving exhausted to the office. a lot, grueling day (though not entirely unpleasant) with a break for an excellent vegan schnitzel lunch, coming home to entertain mr smear, rotate our mattress, be thoroughly impressed by the janus plug design, enjoy shower and bedtime with mr smear, complete more paperwork and now go to bed.

i received a bitcoin tip on reddit yesterday that introduced me to the bitcoin.com and jaxx liberty apps - i think we're heading in the right direction! 

Sunday, February 09, 2020

mid-weekend

WELL.

day 5 crossed paths with gd's birthday and lost. her birthday present? i took her to the visa authority and she picked up her passport with a renewed visa in it. hooray!

after a meeting with a financial advisor, i met up with her again and we went to lekker vegan for lunch. then did a quick grocery shopping, and THEN i went to the workspace to rejoin and get an hour and a half of work in before grabbing a beer with a friend, picking up gd and mr smear and heading to the temple.

mr smear had been feeling sick or drowsy the whole day, he spent most of the evening in my arms. he's heavy, and my neck's noticeably busted, but it's fine.

today began with pancakes and making a bit of a start on a web app i've been thinking about for the past couple of weeks. then i went to the temple for my first time reading from the torah since my barmitzvah (it's been 26 years). i knew there was a batmitzvah happening, but i was *not* prepared for the temple to be packing to overflowing and i had serious stage fright. par for the course, i guess, fortunately i only made one mistake (that i know of, at least) and overall i really enjoyed the experience!

mr smear was falling asleep again, so we scrapped our plans and went home for a relaxed afternoon, most of which i spent on my app which i got to a point where we were able to have fun with it - it's very simple, but hugely entertaining!

after taking mr smear down for a quick swim my mom came over later with The Delivery... the copies of my book i ordered! it's one thing seeing a preview, quite another holding them in real life and seeing that the real thing is even more impressive. SO SATISFIED. please consider purchasing one ^_^

gd and i took my mom's car to the balducci's for her birthday dinner. it was an excellent dinner, we had ourselves a really good time and we both ate too much (as usual).

i've spent the past couple of hours fiddling with the app (lots of cosmetic work to be done now), clearing large attachments from my email (i did a lot last night, too, there's a lot of memory lane stuff which i enjoyed going through), and now i'm way beyond being ready for bed.

it was a great week, and it's been a amazing day.

Thursday, February 06, 2020

day 4

today went by pretty quickly. i was mostly focused. i made progress. i handled a bunch of chores. i let a bunch slide. i think i need to go to bed soon.

Wednesday, February 05, 2020

day 3

i feel pretty hammered, but i guess it is 11.30pm and i have actually been working pretty hard.

yesterday got off on the wrong foot because i had to jump off the toilet for my son, who then proceeded to sit and swing a fool around until he was late for school. i left work after an unexpected lunch (i'd eaten a bit beforehand) to go to the hospital for my MRI, there's nothing like being told "don't swallow" when you have to lie still on your back for twenty minutes during allergy season and you've forgotten to use your nose spray. i had one "incident", the rest was kind of okay.

home - dinner - bedtime routine - bedtime in the dark, due to load-shedding, but it was a good excuse to read more wind in the willows and get to bed relatively early.

today mr smear was quicker to get started, it might be because it was their first real school outing and he seemed excited. i admit i was feeling a bit nervous, but it went well so i'm glad. it was slightly cooler, i was still sweaty when i got to work but less so. another busy day, with a break around lunchtime to meet with the neurologist who explained that my neck's damaged enough to warrant a chat with a neurosurgeon. fantastic. at least i know to avoid all upper body exercise now. wonderful.

i was hungry, i picked up a fair amount of food and shovelled it down before returning to the office for another unexpected lunch. i suspect that's why my stomach was sore and a bit distended this evening. we put our new chairs together, which was a fun team-building experience, and i knocked out my first (extremely minor) change. i'm getting into the meatier parts of golang, i quite like it.

home - dinner - bedtime routine - bedtime, then a mix-and-match of the responsible and the irresponsible and now i think i need to go to bed.

Monday, February 03, 2020

day 1 was pretty good

hot, though. and humid. mr smear gave us a hard time when we left, our therapy session seemed to have gone well, and aside from an hour or so struggling to keep my eyes focused the work day was productive.

also, whoever invented hudson's "the stomper" burger is an absolute genius.

i'm not really sure what i've done this evening after mr smear's bedtime, a bunch of random things. now for bed.

Sunday, February 02, 2020

tomorrow is a new beginning

friday:

mr smear starting a cold (or something like one).

a visit with a neurologist to schedule an MRI, my neck's been in trouble until this morning and it's still a bit finicky.

brownies & downies was an interesting experience, i was awkward with the waitresses but they managed just fine.

an enlightening and entertaining conversation with a financial advisor.

shopping and the lion king. both of them.

going to the temple alone, meeting the family at my cousin's for a really nice family dinner. while mr smear watched the lion king again. his comment that i still don't know what to do with: "simba doesn't need his daddy because he's dead."

jesus, they don't train us for this.

saturday:

mostly indoors. did we go outside? i don't know.

today:

a grumpy start to the day, a walk through the company gardens (and some good hide-and-seek), a relaxed visit to my mom's coffee shop, a nap, a nice swim, a visit to plant for dinner.

moment of the day: mr smear saw a little girl in the restaurant, and informed us that he would let her know that she could be his friend if she wants. he proceeded to run off to play with her, came back five minutes later, sat down awkwardly next to me, thought for a bit and then said - very seriously - "umm... i don't think that was a date".

a brief chat with horseman before lights-out (meaning load-shedding), and mr smear passing out halfway through the first chapter of the wind in the willows. then lying in bed and redditing for a while, getting up and watching the first episode of silicon valley, watching an episode of rick and morty that i don't remember and then trying to make some progress on the next podcast episode before giving up to write this and go to bed.

and tomorrow... tomorrow is going to be interesting. i'm very excited to be start the new contract!