I thought my disdain for conservative politicians couldn’t get any deeper and then some new thing arrives nearly every single day.

All LNP politicians and just about anyone who votes for them exhibit anti-social behaviour in their hatred for anything which doesn’t fit into their 1950’s view of the world.

Under the proposed laws, police would no longer need to obtain approval from a senior officer if operating within a designated zone.

So any hyped up junior constable on a power trip can do what they want. Should end well.

Can we get anyone in favour of this complete b*llshit designed to target the vulnerable moved on instead?

The thing is, Australian Labor is just as complicit in this type of punitive nonsense. They have form when it comes to bad legislation targeting vulnerable people.

They’d probably be in favour of this particularly stupid thought bubble.

Departure time for my flight.

Full load of passengers at gate ✅

Plane at gate ✅

Crew for flight ❌

I like how Flighty sent a flight delayed notification before Virgin Australia announced it at the gate.

It was nice to come back and find this card on my desk today. 

Everyone received a personalised card which is a tremendous effort by our staff engagement group given there are nearly 100 people in the department.

Turns out you can get a decent night sleep if you don’t have a cat waking you up at 4am, 5am and 6am.

In a surprise to nobody, a white conservative boomer politician decided a boring generic name is preferred to naming a new theatre after an indigenous woman.

Also unsurprising, despite it being recommended the same politician doesn’t include the name in a public poll so he can later claim the name he wants was preferred by the public.

The LNP can get in the bin.

Finished reading Slow Horses by Mick Herron ★★★★

I quite enjoyed this. The slow build through the book plus the broad setup for later novels made this a great read. 

Although I knew the plot from having watched the show the introduction to the characters meant I wasn’t seeing the actors in my mind.

Have discovered Falling Skies is on Netflix and adding it to the show roster. With 52 episodes across five seasons a rewatch will keep me going for a while. 

I’ve not watched it again since it first aired so while I remember enjoying it and the broad plot lines I don’t remember every little thing so a lot of it will be like new.

Watched A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms ★★★★½

You may consider it a controversial opinion, perhaps even incorrect, but it’s okay to be wrong sometimes.

Petrol currently ranges between $1.89 and $2.19 a litre in Brisbane. So what Chalmers really means is petrol retailers shouldn’t gouge motorists any more than the usual 30c bounce to the top of the cycle.

Last night I went to my first Queensland Symphony Orchestra performance for the year, the Music of John Williams. I think of these as their fun performances where they’re not playing classical music but music more commonly known and they always have a light hearted nature to them. There is usually a full house and last night was no exception with plenty of children and teenagers in the QPAC Concert Hall audience. I think it’s a great way to introduce children to the joy of a live orchestra.

As you’d expect for a performance of John Williams music it included Indiana Jones, Star Wars, E.T, Jurassic Park, Harry Potter and my favourite the Superman theme. The music from these movies always evokes such a feeling of joy for me. Many of them are movies I’ve watched again and again and stretch across my whole life. The collaboration of Spielberg and Williams is well known but it’s incredible to think Williams has composed the music for all but five of Spielberg’s feature films. 

The original Superman is the first movie I distinctly remember seeing at the cinema when it was released and I truly adore the theme. I still have the original double record sound track in my collection. I was given it for my birthday as I was apparently still raving about the movie when it came around a few weeks later. 

As the conductor remarked last night, name a Marvel superhero movie with such an iconic and instantly recognisable theme! 

Right, let’s see how many gardening metaphors I can use in the one post.*

Back in 2022 I decided I was going to set up a little space of my own on the web, a little digital garden if you like. I’d had various pots sitting all over the place growing nicely in their own ways but wanted them to be together, cultivated and displayed in the same beds rather than haphazardly sitting around waiting to be knocked over and destroyed by a tech bro heavy on the cash but light on the ethics.

I set myself up on micro.blog and was happy enough there for several years, tending the garden beds and letting them gradually fill up and grow out. The crossposting worked well and it allowed me to connect with new people who were very generous with their time and sharing knowledge. It never felt quite right though. The Discovery feed languished after the original community manager left and it wasn’t much use for finding new people and blogs to follow. It regularly featured the same people. 

In the end I decided the values of the owner didn’t align with mine. There were some small incidents but then one large one in early 2025 resulted in a lot of the people I followed departing for other places, with quite a few setting up on Pika. I also set up a small blog on Pika to trial it out but didn’t do too much on it.

I didn’t depart immediately as 2025 was a bit of a year professionally and personally so I used the platform simply because I didn’t have the capacity to think about moving but my primary engagement with others was on Mastodon. I did transition tracking my books and reading to Hardcover though.  The bookshelves on Micro Blog never worked properly for me and the search function regularly didn’t find a book I was trying to add. I also started using EchoFeed by Robb Knight for crossposting rather than using Micro Blog itself.

Over Christmas I decided it was time to stop paying for both services and pick one and I went with Pika. Like neat hedges lined up it has a nice clean format and is all I need. I’ve been gradually transplanting bits of the garden from Micro Blog to Pika. I decided not to dig everything up and replant it but be selective. 

I had everything on Micro Blog with both short and long thoughts starting there and crossposting out but decided I was not going to use Pika the same way. My plan for Pika is to have blog posts and shorter posts I want to retain in one spot, small plants surrounding the bigger trees. Anything else can just be a post directly on Mastodon and Bluesky.

I’ve switched my Type 40 domain over to point at Pika, although it does mean I need to decide what to do with the domain I originally used for Pika. It was an old one I had pointing at Tumblr for many years and then repurposed it. I’m sure I’ll find a use for it soon enough but for now it just gets added to the collection of cuttings I have sitting there waiting to be planted. (Too much of a plant metaphor? Maybe.)

I still have older posts from 2022 - 2024 to dig up and transplant but I think I’m happy enough with it to say I’ve moved.

I do want to give a big shout out to Davey Craney who had two excellent posts which assisted me enormously in deciding to set up on Pika and also the best way to set up Echofeed to crosspost.

*10

Rainy day naps

As a fan of Babylon 5 but frustrated it’s not more readily available, I’m very happy to hear Warner Bros has released it for free on YouTube.

Shopping centre carparks need to start limiting entry by length of car as well as height. Tired of all these huge utes who either stick out into the lane or go over the line into the park behind. 

If your vehicle doesn’t fit within the carpark rectangle then you shouldn’t be allowed in.

Why yes, I am a slut and I’ll proudly wear a badge recognising it.

Someone found the catnip infused dental toy and has been having a good time.

I decided I wanted to read the Slow Horses novels after thoroughly enjoying the TV show. 

Took about six months to go from 72 to 0 in the library hold queue but I finally have the first in the series.

Finished reading The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai, Jesse Kirkwood (translator).

I enjoyed it until it became repetitive. Each chapter was a new investigation but followed exactly the same format. By the time I reached the last few chapters I knew how it would play out.

Each individual chapter is a good short story and an enjoyable read by itself. As repetitive chapters not so much.

The end of this box was pushed against the cupboard door to stop someone getting in….