November 2024 – dangermouse.net

Games on Friday and Saturday

The weather has turned from hot and humid to warm, rainy, and very humid. At least it’s not as hot as Monday to Thursday. Friday was cooler, but very wet. There was a huge thunderstorm around midday, and I had to warn students in my ethics Zoom class that if I disappeared it might be because of a power blackout. Fortunately that didn’t happen, but there some very loud cracks of thunder during the class.

Today has been ridiculously humid. It dropped as low as 87% in the mid-afternoon during a break in the rain, but it’s back up in the high 90s where it’s been most of the day. It was 99% and 21°C when I did my 5k run at 9am this morning. Which made it really draining as breathing deeply while running was like in a sauna.

Friday night was games night at a friend’s place. I took Arcs and we played a four player game, with three of the same players as last time when we all learnt it, and one new player. He picked up the idea quickly and actually ended up winning.

The game took a while to play, and by the time we were done the host was tired, so we didn’t play anything else.

Today, I played a game of Root with my wife. She tried the Marquise de Cat this time, after having played Alliance for the past several games. We used the clockwork expansion bots to fill it out to four players, and it’s the first time we’ve used the Alliance bot player. I played the Vagabond, so we also had a bot Eyrie. The bots started very strong and quickly raced to the lead two places in points. I was really afraid the Alliance bot would win the game. But my wife played a timely Dominance card and secured three mouse clearings with about six cat warriors each and managed to win just before the Alliance could get enough points.

For dinner we went up to Organica and had some pizza tonight. It was sprinkling lightly when we went there, and also on the way home. At least it was better than heavy rain.

In other news: I saw today that Elon Musk has threatened to buy Hasbro and hence Dungeons & Dragons, after his recent unhinged anti-woke rant about D&D. I honestly cannot think of a worse thing for the game. But I rest easy knowing that there are so many roleplaying games out there that people will continue enjoying them in wholesome ways no matter what Musk does.

But I just wanted to point out that I predicted this over 8 months ago! Irregular Webcomic! #5157:

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Sauna weather

Not weather to take a sauna. Weather that is like a sauna. It was really steamy today. The minimum temperature overnight was 24°C, and really humid. I took Scully for a walk first thing in the morning, before breakfast, to avoid the hotter middle of the day, and it was already warm and steamy. When I got home I had to take my sweaty shirt off and let it dry in the bathroom while I changed into a fresh one.

Around midday we had a brief burst of thunder and heavy rain, but it didn’t last very long. It cooled things down briefly, but the temperature began climbing again afterwards, and the wet roads emitted steam into the air. I took Scully out for a short walk and toilet and the air was thick, like breathing in hot soup. I was very glad to return to the air conditioned comfort inside.

I tried to find some cicada shells to photograph and show here, but despite looking around on dozens of trees while out with Scully I didn’t spot any. Just the other day I saw three one on small tree!

I had more ethics classes on “Points of View” and I think I’m getting a handle on how to present questions to the kids on this topic. We’ve been having some very interesting discussions about it.

Oh, it’s also the start of mango season! We had a couple of Calypso mangoes last week, and this week I bought an R2-E2 mango, which I just shared with my wife. It’s good trying all of the different varieties, as they’re quite different once you compare them and get a familiarity for the different flavours and textures.

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Cicada summer

One very noticeable thing about this summer we’re rapidly steaming into: cicadas. The past few years there’s been a distinct lack of cicadas, but this year there’s clearly been a huge hatching. The buzzing of the trees with cicadas is loud and obvious, especially in the early evening. Last night we had to turn the TV up louder than usual to hear it – even with the windows closed.

I’ve also seen a lot more cicada shells left behind in tree trunks as the moulting insects leave them. They’re all over the place. The common Australian species Cyclochila australasiae (“green grocers”) and Thopha saccata (“double drummers”) are different to the North American cicadas, and don’t have the famous periodical breeding patterns. They seem to be a lot less predictable, maybe related to the climate or predators or something. The Australian species are also known for being the loudest insects in the world. Which I can testify to.

It was another hot and humid day today, perfect for the cicadas. Overnight the temperature didn’t drop below 20°C, which is a bit too warm for comfortable sleeping. Tomorrow should be hot too, but with late rain moving in to cool things down for the next few days.

First thing this morning I had to go see my doctor for a routine checkup and blood test results> Rather than brave the heat and walk like I normally would, I took the train there, and then the Metro back, stopping off on the way home to pick up a pastry from Moon Phase (right next door to the Metro station). I think there were only two things on their regular menu that I haven’t tried yet (apart from a tiramisu and an Earl Grey tea thing, which I won’t ever have because of the caffeine). So today I tried the pistachio and rose concoction. It’s a squat cylinder of pastry topped with flowery pink icing and, as I discovered, filled with a substantial pistachio cream filling and raspberries. It was much denser and more filling than I’d assumed.

In the afternoon I did some Darths & Droids comics stuff and made a sourdough loaf. And then had three ethics classes in the evening. I revamped some of the questions and think the lesson plan runs better than last night’s one.

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Hot day, morning walk

The heatwave continues with parts of Sydney almost reaching 40°C today. It was a bit cooler near the coast, thankfully.

To avoid the midday heat, I decided to take Scully on a long walk first thing in the morning, even before I had breakfast. I had a half-formed plan to maybe grab some food on the way, but when we arrived at The Grumpy Baker all the outside tables were taken and the only decent options were the hot pies and rolls, which I didn’t feel like in the heat. So we just continued our walk and I didn’t eat anything until after we got home, a bit after 9 o’clock.

At lunch I just took Scully out briefly for a toilet and then we retreated back inside to the cool. I spent the morning writing up my lesson plan for this week’s ethics topic of “Points of View”. It was a tougher one to write up, and I’m not yet sure after one class this evening if the outline is really good or not. We’ll see tomorrow.

And I just did some comics stuff in the afternoon. Not much else to report today.

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Major urban redevelopment plans

I said yesterday nothing could prevent Australia from losing the first cricket Test to India, and that was borne out today. India won by 295 runs, a massive victory. So India take a 1-0 lead in the series, with four games to play. It’s very hard to see Australia coming back in any way, so comprehensive was the thrashing.

Today, the New South Wales government released plans for redevelopment of several zones around Sydney, including an area close to where I live. There’s already some major construction work going on very close to us, which I’ve mentioned before. Several blocks of single detached houses have been demolished and construction is underway on apartment blocks up to 15 or so storeys tall.

Here’s a render of the full development proposal. (© State of New South Wales, released under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence.)

The white additions are buildings already approved and/or under construction (including the ones I mentioned above). The blue buildings are the newly proposed developments, including the semi-transparent tower in the foreground. Almost all of these sites currently are one or two storey buildings, so it’s a huge increase in the height of buildings in the area. The plan says this will add 5900 new homes (all apartments, I think) to the area. I guess that’s about 15,000 extra people living in the immediate area.

Oh, and some of our favourite places are slated for demolition and redevelopment under this plan. Our favourite pizza place. A slew of other restaurants we’ve frequented over the years. I don’t think there’s any chance this won’t go ahead. Government plans at this stage tend to be inevitable.

I guess we just have to live through it and see how it turns out.

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Harbinger of summer heat

Today was warm. 26.4°C in the city, but we had the benefit of a strong cooling sea breeze all day. Inland suburbs got as high as 37°C. The heat will continue for the next four days at least, with the coastal fringe temperature climbing above 30°C. So I suppose summer is pretty much upon us.

It’s also humid. It’s been regularly in the 80s or 90s percent at night, dropping to 60s during the day. Despite little to no rain for the past couple of weeks. My 5k run this morning was pretty draining – about 23°C and 80% humidity at 9am. I ran a lot slower than yesterday, when it wasn’t nearly as warm.

After showering off, I worked on Darths & Droids comics for a bit. I also watched some of the cricket match being played in Perth, Australia v India. The Indians are absolutely all over this game and there’s no way they can possibly not win from here, without something ridiculous and amazing happening.

Oh geez, no. I just looked at the score at the end of the day’s play. Let me revise what I said. There’s no way that India can possibly not win from here. Full stop. I mean technically there’s a chance they could not win, but if it happens I’ll eat my hat.

I had some ethics classes to teach in the evening, but now I’m going to relax and watch some movie.

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Games night and family lunch

Friday was the fortnightly online games night with my friends. I was a bit late to it because my wife went into the city after work to do some Christmas shopping, and then headed back on the Metro to Crows Nest, where I met her with Scully.

We went to a nearby wine bar for dinner, a place called Knird which we’d wanted to try for some time since they opened a little while back. We managed to get a table out on the alley where it’s located so we could sit with Scully. We had some glasses of wine and ordered a few of the small bites and sharing plates form the menu. The food was all really good and the wines nice. It was a little expensive, but a very pleasant dinner and way to end off the working week.

We made it home a little after 8pm and I joined in the online gaming. We just played some of the old regulars: Just One, Jump Drive, 6 Nimmt.

Saturday morning I got up a bit earlier than usual. After breakfast I went for my 5k run, so I could get back home and have a shower before driving up the coast to my mother’s place. We met her and my brother for lunch at a local pizza place. We had a good lunch and caught up with things. I don’t see my family very much so it was good to have this lunch together.

As we left, my wife said she felt like stopping somewhere along the way home for coffee. I used my phone to search for cafes in the area, but almost every single one was closed. Most closed at 3m on a Saturday. This is one of the super weird things about Australia, compared to most other countries. Nearly all the cafes here close mid-afternoon – it’s virtually impossible to find one open after 3pm.

I did manage to find one, and it had a good star rating, but it was 20 minutes drive away, so we took a scenic route back to the freeway, stopping off there for the coffee. When we got there, it turned out to be more like a general store in a tiny backwater, but they had a coffee machine and my wife got her coffee. After that it was another 20 minutes back to the freeway to drive home again.

We got in around 5pm. I made quiche for dinner, after which we walked Scully in the cool evening air. Today was pretty warm, around 30°C. And when we got home we gave Scully a bath.

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A bit of a goof-off day

This morning I had two more ethics classes on the Robots topic. I was done before lunch and then had a falafel wrap. Normally I have a large tortilla, spread with some tahini, then cheddar cheese, tomato wedges, heated up falafels, and some chilli sauce. I’ll also add cos lettuce if I’ve remembered to buy any recently. But sometimes my wife buys a jar of sweet zucchini pickles from the local farmers’ market – she got them one time on a whim and they turned out to be really delicious, so she keeps restocking when we run out. Anyway, we got a new jar recently and today I added some to my wrap to add a bit of zing. Very nice.

I took Scully for a walk over to Naremburn. We haven’t been there for a while. I sat at the bakery there and had a lamington as a sweet treat. The day was a bit warm, but not too hot. Nice weather.

When we got back home, I had a few things I could have done, but I was feeling like a lazy afternoon after yesterday’s long walk, and the past couple of weeks when I’ve been busy marking assignments. So I just cued up some fun YouTube videos and watched those for a while. Sometimes it’s good to just be lazy for a bit! Well, before three more classes in the evening!

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A walk in Lane Cove National Park

This morning I had some free time, and my wife took Scully to work so I could use the opportunity to travel somewhere where dogs aren’t allowed. I decided to hop on the Metro and take a train to Lane Cove National Park.

This is a tiny national park entirely within the metropolitan area of Sydney. In fact, I only had to ride the train two stops to get there. It follows the banks of the Lane Cove River, one of the tributaries of Sydney Harbour. I know the main entrance area and thought I could walk there down the main road from the train station, but about half way there the road narrowed and the footpath disappeared, and there was no way I could continue without risking being hit by cars, so I had to backtrack and use an alternative route into the park.

But once there, I was greeted by the river, with forested banks on either side.

I’d taken my dSLR camera with a 100-400m lens for shooting birds. I wasn’t disappointed. There were many around, and some fearless. Here’s a suplhur-crested cockatoo:

This Australian brushturkey came right up to me. I took this photo with my phone, not the SLR.

An Australasian darter:

Australian golden whistler:

And I think the photo of the day, a superb fairywren:

I also got photos of a white-throated treecreeper and a brown gerygone, two species I’ve never photographed before, which was good, but unfortunately both photos were a bit blurry and far away, so not really worth showing off. These little birds move so fast it’s ridiculously hard getting a camera aimed at them before they move.

I emerged from another part of the park and walked to a different station to get a train back. I actually stopped on the way to the station to get lunch at a Thai place – the same premises where I used to get lunch when I was working for Canon, but they’ve changed owners and name and now the food is different. But still pretty good.

Here’s a map of the walk, as recorded on Strava.

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A big spring clean chore done

Tuesday mornings are when I work on my lesson plan for the new week’s ethics class. This week we’re talking about Robots. Some questions:

How would you feel if your teacher or sports coach was a robot?
Are there any jobs that should never be done by robots?
If robots start doing lots of work, what will humans do?
Should we program robots to have feelings, or would it be better to keep them as emotionless machines?
If robots become as smart as people, should they ever be given rights such as voting or freedom to do what they want?
If we didn’t give smart robots rights to freedom and voting, would that be slavery?

After completing the lesson plan, I made a new Darths & Droids comic. Then took Scully out for a walk. The day was surprisingly cold up to that point. A chilly southerly breeze actually made things colder at midday than it was at 6:30 in the morning. But the sun came out around lunch time and warmed things up.

This afternoon I tackled a major spring cleaning chore. I removed all the sliding window panes (sequentially) and washed them in the bathroom. Then removed the flyscreens and washed those. Then washed the fixed panes, then replaced the screens and sliding panes. We have laminated glass in most of the windows so the panes are very heavy and it’s tricky getting them in and out and carrying them through to the bathroom. I also had to brush away a lot of spiderwebs from the outsides of the windows. And washing the exteriors of the fixed panes is tricky because we’re above ground level and I have to lean out with a long-handled squeegee. Then I also cleaned the flyscreen door and glass of the balcony doors. All this took a few hours, but now we have sparkly clean windows that look like they’re almost not there at all.

Doing that, somewhere along the way I gave myself a nasty bruise on the sole of my left foot, up near the middle toe. I probably stood on something hard while trying to heft a heavy window pane in or out. I noticed while walking around afterwards and it’s quite sore.

Tonight I had the first Robots class. I think this is going to be a fun one this week!

Oh, I think I mentioned a few days ago that we had our dining chairs reupholstered. Here are before and after photos, to show what they looked like, and how they are now.

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