May Review

 The May review a bit late again.

A few news events for the miscellaneous section:

• An important topic, but the domestic violence outrage dominated the news for a week, politicians committed some money, then it hasn't been heard of since
• The state budget came through, and another four year delay at least for an airport train - it will only be more expensive and difficult the longer it is delayed
• The federal budget came through too, nothing for housing affordability but everyone gets $300 for energy bills !

On with the usual topics starting with running, no races for the month so just some average results at parkrun around 17:50. The only exception was trying to run on icy bridges at Frog Hollow without slipping over, resulting in a much slower time. Had a bit of a battle with a sore knee and a tight calf, but both luckily cleared up within a week.

A bit of shopping for the month too, a pair of Nike Vomero 17 and a second pair of Puma Magnify Nitro 2 since they were each about 40% off. And a new generic charging cable for my Garmin Forerunner means I don't need to buy a new watch, the previously cable just wasn't being detected by Windows anymore.

Just as I was thinking my shares were doing well for the year they went on three consecutive weeks of losses almost every day, I'm back to the beginning of 2024 again, if not worse. It might be time to just sell up and put most of it towards a house deposit. I tried to invest in another share purchase plan but it was oversubscribed like usual so about 50% got refunded.

In other finance related news I signed up for another pair of regular and high interest accounts with another bank, since my current one is changing their rules and reducing the interest rates. I think I've now got accounts with five different banks, although two are empty.

Heading into a bit of a slow period of sports with the premier league finished and NBA finals about the start, but I haven't got much interest in that at the moment. At least we have a few other things like the T20 world cup, European soccer championships and Olympics on the way soon. I went to the match between Newcastle and Tottenham at the MCG, it was very strange to be organised less than three days after the premier league finished. The first half had most of the regular players but the second half was pretty boring and a rotating cast of substitutes.

The to do list is slowly moving along:

• Blogs
• Haven't done the 2023 or 2024 posts - aiming for this month
• Holidays
• Still undecided, USA looks very expensive and a bit less likely this year now
• New computer
• Fully running with the new computer at last, although I prefer Windows 10 to 11
• Finally purchased a small, cheap KVM switch which is working great
• Running holidays
• Still depends on other holidays, but been watching for Singapore Marathon registrations

Also up and running with a new computer at work that wasn't too bad after a long first day waiting hours for the machine to initialise, otherwise nothing much else.

That's it for this month.

• Books
• None
• Movies
• None
• Music
• None
• TV
• Race Across The World season 3
• Actually spent the whole season in Canada
• Did not like how much time they had to spend hitchhiking as a transport solution
• 4 out of 10
• Video Games
• Xbox 360
• Dead Space 3
• Finished at last
• Replayed on Classic mode, didn't realise it was fixed at hard difficulty
• Replace on Pure Survival mode, also hard difficulty and no ammo/health drops