Big Brother

I will admit that I'm not that particular when it comes to matters of privacy. Unlike kids of today, my social media is an open book. I do, however, subscribe to the notion that whatever you post is the same as wearing it down the street on a T-shirt, forever, so that does give me pause for thought.

I've only recently popped a bit of tape over my laptop camera. That was recommended by my kids, although really, who wants to watch me type?? And I have to remember to peel it off for Zoom meetings.

Sass did point out that she was NOT happy that my name and mobile number popped up in Google Maps, connected to our address. It seemed that it had somehow hooked into my business and thought it was doing me a favour - but that was quickly and simply unhooked and deleted!!

Retargeting also doesn't bother me. That's when you look at a website or do a Google search on say, trips to Bali and then every site you go to for the next few days serves up ads for holidays to Bali. My work gives me cause to search for all kinds of sites - from incontinence products to aged care facilities - none of which I'm actually in the market for, but Google doesn't know that. Loser.

Some people I know are cautious about shopping online. Not me. I cheerfully hand over my details to any old eCommerce site as the convenience is just too... well... convenient! I did once have the misfortune of clicking a link to track a parcel from China that contained a 'browser hijack'. That's when your usual search engine page is unwittingly taken over and filled with ads and other crap that doesn't look familiar. Most annoying. That one required a call to the IT peeps.

But there are some things that I wouldn't share for the sake of privacy - and one is my DNA. I know this has become very popular to find out about your ancestry, but I don't like the concept. Maybe because we have a family history of dodgy genes - which could be held against someone at some point in time. You also don't know what it might reveal - like a close friend of mine who, just via the standard letter, discovered a previously unknown fourth sibling!!

The other one that my intuition rejects is Google Home and other 'listening' tech. I've heard this joke several times over the last few months:
I was talking to my wife in bed the other night and she said, Why are you whispering?
I said I didn't want anyone to hear.
She laughed, then Siri laughed, then Alexa laughed.

I thought it was kind of lame - until one evening last week...

As we were getting into bed, Geoff commented that he liked the new coconut flavoured toothpaste I'd bought (WhiteGlo - just FYI) - and we had a brief conversation about the other varieties there are and where I'd bought it. I settled into bed and picked up my phone for a bit of 'Words With Friends' - and look what popped up.

Eeek!

I think I'd best put a bit more focus on that privacy thing!

Kidless

After 26 years and seven months, we are (temporarily) kidless. But who's counting??

And just quietly, it's pretty bloody fantastic! Just don't tell the kids...

Sass headed off to boarding school (just for the year) and Elle's moved back to Canberra for uni.

Praise be the day!!!

Before she left, Elle was insisting I'd be lonely and miss nagging them. True, it's only been five days, but they have been very peaceful days and I haven't missed asking eight times across a 12-hour period for her to PLEASE empty the dishwasher, pick up after herself, wipe the bench after she's eaten and turn the lights off if she's not in the bedroom/bathroom/kitchen. (Is it possible to get the kids to pay the odd power bill? You know, just for the life-experience...)

Sass left - with nine huge bags of stuff - about 10 days ago. We'd been gathering, shopping, naming and checking that list a hundred times. As one mum said, every time you check, something else appears that you swear wasn't there before. When I say 'list', it went on for pages - more of a booklet really. Everything from sheets and towels, toiletries and textbooks, to hiking gear and stationery. There was stuff all over the place - and now it's all gone!!! Yay.

Elle was next. She had an absolute car-load of clothes, homewares, bedding, cushions, books, a large jute rug, a NutriBullet, leftover beer and wine from her 21st party and a few jars of pickled red cabbage she'd made. And that too is now all outta the house!!

Order has been restored.

Gary seems a little confused, but appears to be embracing the serenity.

 On her day of departure, Elle headed off before 6am and I had a summit to attend at 7am. But when I returned, the first thing I did wasn't to check my email - but to vacuum. I was so happy!!

Since then, I've mopped the floors, washed, polished and vacuumed my car (including the footprints on the passenger side window - I kid you not), rearranged the fridge, tidied the laundry - and everything is as I left it!! It's a miracle.

No one is using my debit card for things they 'feel like' at the supermarket, I've watched MAFS uninterrupted and can even go to the loo without someone insisting I look at something 'amazing' they've just found on the internet.

Perhaps I will get bored and lonely - but then again, maybe I won't!

Remotely Weird

Although we headed away for Christmas, we did have the traditional Christmas lunch of relatives and relatives-who-aren't-related (RWAR) before we left.

There were people in this household who were campaigning strongly for a live Christmas tree for the occasion - and I was resisting - hard! There's nothing worse than coming home from a beach holiday, dealing with a laundry full of sand AND a crispy dead Christmas tree that the local rubbish collectors will NOT pick up.

There were mutterings that the house didn't feel very Christmassy, so I threw a few decorations around, including a lovely red bauble on our resident fake palm tree and dared them to disagree that it didn't scream 'Christmas!!"

Recognising that part of the illusion is the smell of pine, I hatched what I thought was a very cunning plan: I ordered fake candles online for the summer-empty fireplace and got Elle to duck up to Central Park where the Scouts sell Christmas trees and fling them a few bucks for some offcuts. The effect was as I'd hoped - a lush green bed, emitting the smell of Christmas with flickering candles - but sadly, I failed to take a photo - so you'll have to take my word for it.

Anyway, like so many things online these days, the wax candles with 'life-like flames' arrived with a dodgy remote. Seriously - not that hard to turn the on/off switch on the base - and I've recently discovered if you don't actually switch them off, they chew through batteries like there's no tomorrow.

The novelty of the remote wasn't lost on me, so I gave it go - and the strangest thing happened (no, it didn't just 'work'!! - in fact, as suspected, it was a bit hit and miss). When I turned the candles on - it kinda worked, but I had to hit the 'on' button a few times and get close enough that I might as well have just use the bloody switch! However, when I turned them off, watch the video to see what Shanequa (the robot vac) did....

Riddle me that!!!

Are sea lions dangerous?

Yeah – like me, you’d probably need to Google that.

And even, like why?

Because Sass and I had had a close encounter with this one when we were at Robe over Christmas.

We were in the surf – without boards (I don’t recall why) – just leaping around in the waves when I thought I spotted someone on a board ‘out the back’. Then they disappeared.

A moment later ‘they’ reappeared and I realised it was an animal.

“Look Sass!’ I said, pointing. “It’s a seal!”

At a safe distance, the concept of being in the waves with a seal was kind of appealing.

And then it caught a wave, body surfing towards us like a torpedo. And I realised it was a heck of a lot bigger than a seal.

Sass and I were both wearing black wetsuits and the thought occurred to me that perhaps this brute thought we were a couple of females of the same species that he should check out.

At that point, I wondered if sea lions were dangerous. Having not Googled that before, I wasn’t sure, so decided panic was the best course of action.

“Sass! Run! Get out of the water!!” We waded as fast as we could through waist-deep water, eventually making it to the beach before our new friend.

 

This is a stock shot but you get the idea

This is the actual sea lion in question - Sass got a shot from the cliff

He did come onto the beach where we later noticed he had a flesh wound near his tail - maybe from a boat propeller, fishing line - or even a shark. He didn't say.

But back to the question; I did Google and it said sea lions aren't usually dangerous,  but they are very large, have sharp teeth and are wild animals.

Panic vindicated! 

The Kitchen Table

We're still getting rid of things post the renovation. Some of the delay has been caused by a lack of access. In packing up to commence demolition, large items were placed, Tetris-style, into the shed.  with smaller crates packed into the gaps. It's taken months to get our two large mirrors back on the wall as they were trapped behind an enormous mahogany writing desk and blocked from the side by an antique blackwood pew.

The desk has since found a happy home in Canberra, the pew has been reinstated inside and the mirrors, finally, have been hung. At last, I could get to the kitchen table so I could take a few snaps and get it on eBay. (You might recall the win I had with our new dining table).

We've had the table for over 25 years. We had it made from recycled Oregon and over the years, changed the colour of the stain, had it widened, a drawer added, as well as changed the legs from turned to tapered. It had served us well, but it was time to go.

Pricing on eBay is tricky and you need to take care not to confuse emotional connection with commercial reality. The table was solid timber and we'd had many happy times around it - kids' birthdays, dinner parties, Christmases - but no-one on eBay cares about that - they want a bargain! Nor is there a short supply - so it had to be priced to sell.

I popped it on for a seven-day auction starting at $100, which on expiring, I was offered $50 from a woman in a nearby suburb who could collect it - immediately - SOLD! And here's where the hilarity began...

The buyer arrived with roof racks to which was attached a bike fitting.  She had some vague idea that the table could just sit next to bike rack.... yeah, no. This is a very large, heavy, solid timber table - that hasn't got removable legs.

She eventually managed to get the bike attachment off and it took her, the girls and me to get it onto the rack. I asked if she had ropes and she assured me she did, pulling out three occy straps!! (Occy straps, short for octopus straps, are those lengths of cloth-covered of elastic with a hook on each end - notorious for flinging off or snapping at inopportune moments.) She wrapped one around a leg and hooked it to the roof rack, after which we left her to do the other two. She did assure me she was going to drive slowly, but I could just picture her braking at a red light and the table sliding forward, down her windscreen and onto her bonnet. The whole thing seemed highly precarious and frankly, dangerous!

Anyway, I had my $50 and the table was out of the shed, so frankly, not my problem!!! (Although of course, I do hope no-one was hurt!)

An inconvenient call

I don't know why it popped into my head, but this morning I recalled one of the most bizarre phone calls I've ever had.

It was late on the morning of Monday, January 4th, 1999.

How do I recall that so specifically? Because I was in the birthing suite at the hospital!!!

I would have taken the call on my very corporate Nokia - remember these??

I'd arrived at the hospital earlier that morning for what Geoff would later describe as 'the most boring day of my life'. My contractions, like the action in the cricket on the TV, were intermittent and separated by long periods of tedium. It's probably why I took the call.

For many workers, it was the first day back after the Christmas/New Year break - luckier ones had an additional week. I'd finished up work when the office had closed - about two weeks prior - and was planning to return in April, so I assumed it was family or a friend. In those days, your phone didn't tell you who was calling - you either recognised the number or took your chances by picking up.

It turned out to be the Executive Assistant to the Managing Director of a financial services client I looked after, and I was, needless to say, surprised she was calling. She'd previously struck me as a bit vague, but this time she excelled herself. Here's how the conversation went:

MMW: MWW speaking...
EA: Hi MWW and happy new year. Did you have a nice Christmas?
(Bit of small talk)
EA: The MD has asked me to ring you as he's hoping you'll be able to attend a workshop he's having on Thursday
MWW: Yeah, probably not - I actually started maternity leave before Christmas...
EA: Oh, really? I didn't realise it was so soon... I thought you still had a while to go (Said in a way that suggested maybe I'd got that wrong and she was, in fact, correct...)
MMW: Yes. I'm actually at the hospital now.
EA: Oh... right. So.... you won't be able to do the workshop on Thursday? (In a tone that suggested perhaps I could and should)

Seriously.

And when I did clearly state that no, I wasn't available, she sounded rather put out.

Oh, well.

Generational time keeping

When I was a kid, getting your first watch in late primary school was a rite of passage. I got mine in grade 4 or 5 when my parents had been somewhere in Asia and bought me a pale pink and white one. I was so proud.

Later, in high school, Mum gave me a watch with a slim black leather strap, a gold rim, and a white face with the numbers written in French in a black script font. It's really quite classic and I still have that one somewhere. I don't wear it as it needs to be wound and ain't no one got brain-space to remember to do that!!

These days, fewer kids wear a watch at all. George had quite the collection but in truth, they were more of an 'accessory' to a look than serving a function. I don't recall the girls ever wearing a watch. I could be wrong, but if they did, it was brief.

Even today, they just use their phone or laptop and insist there's no need for one.

Gone too, is the thrill of changing your analogue clock or watch for the start or end daylight saving, trying to remember if it's forwards or backwards and the inevitable colleagues who fronted up to work at the wrong time because they forgot or got it wrong. Now it just happens automatically - even if you move time zones.

Cleaning out a drawer the other day, I stumbled across the watch my grandmother left me. Probably from around the 1920s, it's sweet but so impractical. There'd be no 'quick glance' to see the time on this! It's elegant but tiny!! Maybe people were smaller back then?

Compare that to my watch! I've had two of these. The first for probably five years before the gold wore off and some of the 'diamonds' had fallen out. I also took a big chip out of the glass when I fell off my bike. So I waited for the January sales and just bought another one.

Other than being about 10 times bigger than my grandmother's watch, it also has a much shorter life span. I know some people invest in a proper, 'for life' watch, but I tend to just go with fashion. I can't even guess at how many I've owned.

Anyway, the next generation will be making up for my disposable extravagance by owning no watch at all!