Another year of monthly reviews.
A bit of miscellaneous to start.
- Australia Day negativity seemed to hit an all-time high this year, or possibly the media overdid it with their coverage. It seemed like it was several straight days of anger and hostility, rather than trying to promote something that might lead to a better outcome
- Holiday car accidents and drownings also seemed to hit an all-time high this year, every day one or more tragedies being reported
- What better way to start the year than have almost every bill possible due:
- ATO advance tax payment for 6 months
- Car annual registration
- Car annual service
- Car driver licence for 10 years
- Council annual rates
- Dentist three times !
- House repairs
- Passport renewal soon
- Running holidays for this year - flights, hotels, race entries
Back to the usual, starting with running in the heat of summer although there's been very few hot days this year actually. Besides a new parkrun on January 1st I have just been revisiting local events and forever filling in new event numbers - only a few left under 200 now. My finishing times have been under 18 minutes but nothing really quick to be proud of yet.
Had my first race for the year at the Rosebud January 26 10km. The race conditions made a good time impossible, a severe head and cross wind for the first four kilometres added well over a minute, then some heavy rain while trying to overtake all of the walkers and slow joggers in the 5km event who started at the same time half way along the same course. Probably the first time I've had a very bad result and finished in about 39 minutes, would have been happy to be close to 38 minutes. This was the first time I tried the New Balance RC Elite 2, they felt a little heavier and less speedier than Nike, but the problem on this course was I got a giant rock stuck in the space underneath the shoe for most of the race and was a little uncomfortable.
Those were actually the second pair of New Balance RC Elite 2 I bought this month, before even trying out the first pair I got last year, but they'll be good enough for training and some races maybe. I also got some Puma Magnify Nitro 2 that will hopefully be good for long runs and Nike React Infinity 3 for daily runs. Should not be at risk of running out of shoes for a while again now.
Not much to report in shares, although the ASX briefly hit a new high it's just back to where it was in 2021. Sadly I've had more bad than good individually since then so haven't profited much, I should have just invested in the USA markets for the last few years - or forever.
In sports we've had the Australian Open pass through Melbourne again. I think I attended two years ago and don't feel the need to go again for a while, I'm surprised the amount of crowds they get coming back each year. The BBL also concluded, it hasn't been that exciting for years since there's very few international players involved - including the Australian teams - but it's something to watch on TV for a couple of months. The NFL is heading into the superbowl next week, but Kansas City vs. San Francisco are among the two teams I'm the least interested in seeing.
A bit going on with the to do list coming into the new year:
- Holidays
- Nothing scheduled yet, I don't know if I want to squeeze anything else into the first half to the year
- I'd like to go to USA again later in the year, but dates are hard since NBA and NFL fixtures for next season won't be out for month
- Need to get new credit card, passport, and suitcase all before then
- New computer
- Got most software installed but haven't copied any other files across yet
- Purchased a 2TB internal PCIE NVMe drive for storage - so small compared to the old drives
- The CPU or CPU cooler has been making some weird sort of scratching sound
- Reports
- 2023 running review done
- 2023 review and 2034 preview not done - I actually skipped them both last year
- Running Holidays
- This is slightly easier to book than a long holiday
- Bendigo - March hotel booked for 10km
- Ballarat - April race booked for 10km - can probably drive in the morning
- Brisbane - June fully booked for 10km
- Gold Coast - July fully booked for 21km
Been busy at work with a short burst of activity to start the year, but doubt it will last for the next six months. Was good to be able to relax after concluding the Advent Of Code for another year.
That's it for this month, a bit of a long update to begin.
- Books
- None
- Movies
- None
- Music
- None
- TV
- Break Point season 2
- So badly presented with the focus on USA men's players for 2 of 6 episodes
- The way they skip through the year and don't mention losing is frustrating
- 3 out of 10
- Squid Game The Challenge
- Could have been terrible but was just alright
- Too many games were just complete chance, literally a roll of the dice
- 5 out of 10
- True Detective season 1
- Finally watched a season
- Not as good as I was expecting from the reviews
- Too much split between the past and present, and a bit lacking with the depth of the main case
- 6 out of 10
- Video Games
- Xbox One
- Mass Effect 3
- At last finished all the achievements, such a bad storyline to sit through