Matisyahu's Blog

"When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called 'the People's Stick'"

recent posts

  • End of the first day back at work.

    Today was a good first day at work, nothing demanding, the usual customer enquiries but with customer’s probably still on holiday with the family things may not pick up until next week when people come back from their annual leave. Today mum was down at Kmart (yes, we still have them in New Zealand) and picked up 2 x 5kg barbells (I was going to go for 10kg but decided 5kg is good enough) and when I have been on a break I’ve done some reps while I’ve ben on break watching some YouTube videos in the lounge room. I think I find it easier if, when I have a spare moment, to get some exercise in rather than necessarily putting some time aside although I want to get myself into some sort of routine.

    Tonight I’ll go for a small walk just for the sake of getting some exercise in and the meals I’ve had to today have kept me within my calorie count so I am looking forward to a good start to the new year. This coming year the big focus is on consolidating those gains, embedding those lifestyle changes and hopefully by the time I have time off in June I’ll be below 100kg while ensuring that with the regular weights at home I’ll maintain muscle which will ensure that as weight is loss that muscle isn’t lost (which can cause ones metabolism to slow down). I think it’ll be one of those things that one I integrate these changes into my life it’ll become second nature.

    After a year of getting so far I don’t want to slip backwards – the benefits haven’t just been when it comes to my health but also quality of life where it is easier to get out of bed, the energy to do what I want, when I go down to the store and want to buy clothes I’m able to buy clothes off the rack without wondering whether they’ll have it in my size. Although I have lost weight I still prefer to have baggy pants – mainly because I wear pants all year around so during summer having them lose makes them a lot more comfortable.

    When I woke up this morning I was greeted with uBlock Origin Lite 2025.1229.1729 being made available on on the macOS and iOS App Store – I quickly installed it and let the filters update themselves (there is a conversion process which converts it from the native uBlock Origin Lite format into the native format that the content blocking API that the Declarative Net Request (DNR) sits on top of (the native content blocking sits underneath DNR)).

  • It makes me wonder.

    I was watching a few videos tonight regarding the changes in the mandates in the United States regarding pollution regulations and fuel economy standards regarding whether the series of steps to deregulate is setting the car industry up to a change in tariff policy between the United States and China. I say this because at the moment there is quite steep tariffs on Chinese made EVs being imported into the United States and the Trump administration are talking about allowing Kei vehicles into the United States. With those changes taking place are we going to see a change in policy along the lines of “now I’ve taken the shackles off your industry, I’m going to remove the protection for your industry”. It’ll be interesting to see what occurs in the coming year – personally I think the use of tariffs by Trump have more to do with seeing it as a tool to express power through rather than any sort of deep understanding of how tariffs actually work in reality. It would fit into his modus operandi of being attracted to ways of projecting power and he see’s it as a way of doing just that – “do what I say or you won’t get access to the United States”.

    That being said, it could be all moot because we may see the Supreme Court say the tariffs he imposed were illegal which would mean that there would be refunds from the tariffs collected which leads me to wonder whether he knows that the tariffs are going to be overturned which is why there has been a flurry of deregulation so when the tariffs do come off as a byproduct of the court making their decision that United States industry is ready for the disappearance of Trump protectionism. That being said, I am assuming that there is some sort of method to madness rather than it simply being the mad king doing mad things because of deep seated issues – the crazy driver and the rest of the world are the unwilling passenger holding onto our dear life in a hope we arrive all in one piece.

    Back closer to home there is talk about a free trade agreement with India with unfortunately doesn’t give the New Zealand agricultural sector the sort of access that the current free trade agreement that New Zealand has with China. One of the sticking points has been the part of the free trade agreement regarding being able to work in New Zealand after graduating with the question being whether we’ll have the amount of accommodation required because at the moment. At the moment due to an increase in supply of houses plus outflow of New Zealanders overseas there has been downward pressure on rents for the first time in many years – with more students staying in New Zealander after graduation are we going to see increased demand putting upward pressure on rent? what is the plan in terms of building more housing to ensure that there is some sort of balance between supply and demand for housing?

    I can’t help but get the feeling that this free trade agreement is about helping out the landlords once again by boosting demand which in turn will boost house prices so then New Zealanders can feel artificially richer who will then load up on debt and get the economy working. What would be the real solution to our economic woes? promoting investment into businesses turning commodities we export into final goods so then we’re price makers not price takers, investing into infrastructure that improves productivity and competitiveness, encouraging businesses to invest into capital to improve productivity and competitiveness. To do that would require a long term plan – something that New Zealand governments tend to do a pretty lousy job at.

  • Don’t allow time to absolve people not taking responsibility for their political decisions.

    I’ve been noticing that towards the end of the first year of the second Trump administration that there is a concerted effort by people to rebrand/reinvent themselves or if they’re not as high profile they’re purging their timeline as if their past position regarding Trump will magically disappear. We saw this in the first term of the Trump administration by those who jumped onboard the ‘Trump train’ then went to ground after the 2020 loss to Biden then came back in 2024. The difference is that this time Trump is on his second term and people are planning for a post Trump politics – some have been hurt by the policies being advanced by Trump but some also are jockeying for position when it comes to who will be the new leader of MAGA and whether MAGA is a political movement that can survive beyond Trump or whether it is a cult of personality where there is only one person can lead the movement and without that person at the helm there is no movement to speak of.

    The problem with MAGA is that it isn’t clearly defined other than it being an extension of Trump’s personality – whatever Trump says is MAGA is MAGA but even the rhetoric being used on the campaign isn’t translating into policy as we’re seeing MAGA supporters unhappy with the changes, the number of MAGA supporters dropping the label to become traditional Republican. The fact that the definition of MAGA can’t be nailed down is by design rather than by accident – when something is vague then the audience can interpret it the way they see fit, they can project their own hopes, dreams, wishes, whims and desires onto it because it is a blank canvas which is why the coalition is so broad resulting in any most anyone being able to join it.

    The problem is that when you make the coalition overly broad it does allow you to create a large voting base but it is entirely useless as a means to bind the party together to work as a cohesive unit once into power. This is why you end up having a big tent filled with factions that are at odds with each other – in opposition the only thing that holds the party together is ‘we hate the Democratic Party’ then the moment they win power they descend into infighting because there is no agreed upon agenda where politicians have put aside their individual egos for the greater good. A good example of that failure to come up with a legislative agenda would be the 10+ years they’ve had to come up with a comprehensive replacement for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) only to have vague ‘concepts of a plan’ and random ideas thrown at the wall by random backbenchers but nothing in the way of a coherent plan.

    Getting back to the people who voted for him, this is what happens when you commodify politics to nothing more than “what can I get out of this” instead of asking the bigger question of “what kind of society do I want”. It is clear that those who voted for Trump and the Republicans didn’t think about the larger question by virtue of their reaction when the Trump administration with the support of Republicans passed the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ which resulted in the very same voters finding that they lost ACA subsidies, reduced or losing medicaid coverage, their medicare coverage wasn’t as extensive, the food stamps they had been receiving for years they’re now having to go through a maze of means testing bureaucracy to apply for the assistance again. They thought that the ‘waste, fraud and abuse’ was referring to someone else – they were quite happy to see others go through the pain of missing out because in their mind they were receiving legitimate assistance where as all those people they didn’t know were welfare queens mooching off the system. What these people failed to realise is this, the billionaires view them as the waste, fraud and abuse,

    This is what happens when you fail to understand policy, when you think about politics in terms of only yourself and fail to see politics as something that extends beyond your own narrow self interest. It is like watching someone raging against welfare right to the point that they lose their job and realise that they’re now dependent on that very form of assistance they they voted to get rid of – but it now too late because it is now gone. Once again, only caring about something when they’re directly impacted.

    Another good example is what I’ve said in the past: “there is a high price to low taxes and regulation”, if there is a tax cut or a promise of a tax cut then the first thing that should be asked is “how is it going to be paid for” because you may find that you’re actually worse off. For example, you get an income tax cut but the cost of car registration goes up, the public transport receives less investment and lower reimbursement resulting in higher fares, the lower regulations result in a coal plan opening but the consequence long term is global warming being accelerated. There is price paid when promises are made for lower taxes and regulations – be careful for what you wish for.

    Getting back to the issue of vibes based voters and not allowing them believe that their behaviour will be forgotten. We’re already started to see podcast bros trying to claim that they were never big Trump fans, that ‘the mainstream media blew it out of proportion’ and that they’re an independent. Really, an independent even though you spent literally hours glazing Donald Trump with soft ball questions and giggling like a school girl around their secret crush. Now such podcast bros are trying to reposition themselves as if they’re above the fray but here is the problem, the internet never forgets, there are many, many, many clips that have been uploaded to various fan accounts and other platforms so they may wish for the world to forget but the reality is that the internet never forgets. What it demonstrates is that these podcast bros never believed in anything, it was a giant grift from the outset.

    Regarding Trump voters, these are the same people who vote based on vibes which is why when you look through their voting history it is completely incoherent, there is no through line that many any sense – they were all in on the whole ‘compassionate conservatism’ with George W Bush where anyone who questioned the wisdom of going into Iraq and Afghanistan were accuse of siding with the terrorists and wanting make the United States weak, who jumped onboard the ‘freedom fries’ train, the boycotting of the Dixie Chicks even though they never listened to a single one of their songs, and then wearing 10 gallon hats with cowboy boots.

    These same people who claimed they cared about budget deficits were silent when under George W Bush they were running deficits of between $300-$500 billion per year but they suddenly jumped onboard the ‘tea party’ bandwagon the moment the first black president was voted into office. The same people who claimed they wanted small government but wanted a constitutional amendment to band same sex marriage. The same people who spent 8 years, while Obama was president, claiming that Obama was a secret Communist who wasn’t really an American (pushed by the Birtherism curtesy of Trump) but when Trump won in 2016 they gave Trump the credit for an economic recovery that continued in spite of the idiotic policies that Donald Trump implemented in that first term.

    The reason I say that we should never allow ex-Trump supporters to forget what they did is because these are the same people who 10 years after Nixon left the Whitehouse claimed they never voted for him, the same people who claimed they never voted for Reagan etc. etc. always disavowing their voting choice because their vote was never based on a firm grasp of policies but rather vibes based politics regarding how the campaign made them feeling rather than a firm grasp on what the problems were and what was being propose as a solution. As long as a sizeable number keep voting based on vibes and never learn why voting based on vibes is a bad idea then expect history repeating itself in the future. To avoid this we also need civics lessons at school to ensure that the next generation engage in politics in a meaningful way rather than based on vibes – to make an informed voting decision based on a clear understanding of what is being proposed by what ever political party they choose to vote for.

  • Getting ready for work tomorrow.

    The groceries I ordered last night arrived and I put them all away along with having some breakfast then after that I went around spraying some weedkiller on the places where the weeds grow in-between the concrete. After all that was sorted I jumped onto my work laptop to check for updates – Dell update, updates for Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome, then the Windows Update in the settings up. I also worked through the 50 or s emails I had received while on annual leave (I completely disconnected from work over those two weeks) and got that sorted out and it I received an email from my boss about a $100 gift card so I’ll have a look into what I can turn that into in terms of store gift vouchers (I’m tempted to to get a UniFi Cloud Gateway (Fibre) which wold replace my Cloud Key and Gateway which wold simplify my setup (the UniFi Cloud Gateway range includes the gateway and cloud key functionality in the same package).

    uBlock Origin Lite version 2025.1229.1729 has been released with quite a few features (link) with it now available in the Microsoft Edge extension store but hasn’t arrived in the Google Chrome or Apple App Store yet on macOS or iOS. MV3 when it was first launched came under a lot of legitimate criticisms from developers, privacy advocates and end users because the functionality of the Declarative Net Request wasn’t as extensive as what existed on MV2 and the webRequest API. If you’ve got time it pays to check out the WECG meeting minutes which outline the work that is being done to harmonise the web extension framework so that it is possible to write an extension and for it to run on multiple platforms with minimal changes.

    It has stated raining outside so I’ll have a quiet at home with an early night in bed so then I’m fully recharge for my first day back at work. I’m looking forward to the work meet up on 27 January so I’ll have a chat with my boss about having an annual leave on the next day so then I have two days off from work. The bigger annual leave I’ll have in the first couple of weeks in June when WWDC happens. I see that there are various reports of when the M5 refresh comes out but I have a feeling that if the reports of memory shortage are anything to come by then I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a price hike particularly when it comes to BTO options with additional memory. I’m happy I took the opportunity to buy my M4 based Macs when I had the chance – the performance difference isn’t massive so why wait.

  • One more day to go.

    I’m back to work on Wednesday but in the mean time I’m savouring every moment until I have to get back to work. I’ve ordered some groceries online tonight for deliver tomorrow so that I have my pantry stocked for the coming fortnight so then I’m all ready. After ordering groceries I then went for a walk for 11.6km and the weather was wonderful, lovely fresh air, a slight breeze and pretty quiet – it appears that people are getting back to work gradually or returning from holidays but keep in mind that in a lot of cases the country is pretty quiet over the Christmas and New Year with things probably getting back into full swing at the start of next week.

    I was watching a YouTube video from Zollotech regarding the 26.3 beta release which covered observations made since the beta was released with the potential for a 26.2.1 release maybe making its way before the 26.3 release is made. I’m interested in seeing what the new user interface design head does given that he has decades of experience in Apple and back to NeXT so he knows how to make a good user interface. The big question is what will be done about the current situation with Liquid Glass – are we going to see some minor tweaks to address some of the most egregious issues end users have raised and the issues raise that will require a lot more heavy lifting will be let for the 27 release which is rumoured to be like a Snow Leopard release – no new features, focusing on fit ‘n finish.

    I’m having a look at some clothes I have seen online and although my two wardrobes are full of clothes I can’t help but love picking up unique items particularly if I can get them on special. The clothes I’m having a look at are around 40% off and they’re from a retailer that has good quality clothing and the style of clothing is something you can buy and find that in 5-10 years time you can still wear them because they don’t look dated.

    I’m also looking at a fabric tub chair for my desk in the lounge room which will be more comfortable than what I have at the moment along with looking at maybe a few art prints from all posters (I’ll get them framed in New Zealand since frames are pretty easy to come by at either Kmart or The Warehouse) – Henri Rousseau or maybe a Rene Magritte. I’m still having a look at some plants for inside to add some greenery inside but the is a work in progress but I’ve seen a Hawaiian palm tree of around 180cm high which is about the right height and the store has a good selection so if I am going to purchase it I’ll probably buy a few of them all at once so I can all completed in one go.

    Daily writing prompt
    What makes you feel nostalgic?
    View all responses

    Spending time with family – remembering the other times that as a family we got together, remembering when dad was still alive and kind of sad that I didn’t appreciate him until he was gone and unfortunately I look back with regret. With that being said, these days I make sure I treasure every day that I can spend with mum and the family. What brings back memories are the meals mum makes which reminds me of when I was young – home made hamburgers, on Friday night heading down to the fish ‘n chip shop then coming home to watch MASH on television (mum’s favourite show) while enjoying the fish ‘n chips and a cup of mellow yellow.

  • End of the year draws near.

    Just before I head off to sleep, the end of the year draws near and I look back at what has happened throughout the year, I have to admit that personally I’ve had a good year getting closer to my health goals but that being said it hasn’t been a great year outside of that – a crazy person in the Whitehouse leading to global instability. What I am hoping is that as the rest of the world works around the Trump administration that the such work will insulate the New Zealand economy and we’ll get back on track with some economic growth.

    I am pretty lucky regarding the situation I am in but for many New Zealanders they’re doing it tough if the quiet malls and supermarkets are anything to go by but then again I could be wrong. There has been an uptick in the number of people purchasing gifts online so it could be a matter of fewer people shopping in stores because they’re switched to ordering online but that being said the supermarkets are pretty quiet so when it comes to thinks you need to purchase for Christmas Day so I think for many families the money situation is pretty tight.

    Coming into the new year I’m starting a fresh after indulging in some wonderful food over the two weeks I’ve had off from work but I thought it would be best to get back into the swing of things by starting afresh this Monday (29/12/25) before the new year starts. I mentioned previously that one of the things I’ve reminded myself before I eat something is “am I hungry or am I just bored” and the second thing I’ve focused on is making sure that I always have a pantry filled with nutritious food that can be easily prepared thus eliminating the excuse of ordering take aways or heading down to the store to pick up random bits of food.

    If there is one ray of sunshine it has been the realisation by many around the world that GDP growth doesn’t translate to the average person getting wealthier. All the growth in the United States economy can be summarised to AI investments (more like malinvestmens) and the the cost of healthcare going up since those numbers contribute to GDP figures – remove those factors and the US would be in a recession right about now. I think there are many waking up to the fact that ‘line go up’ doesn’t translate to ‘more money in bank account’.

    The big question is whether this will translate to the left putting out a bold vision or whether we will see more of the same neoliberal half baked solutions that never address the underlying problems in the economy. All too often I see the nominal left in New Zealand diagnose a problem correctly but then half ass the implementation – almost scared that they might actually have to sell the idea and defend the idea against the expected push back by those in the media and parties on the right. It’s almost as though the left are scared of their own shadow because they limited their horizon due to many convincing themselves that there is no alternative to neoliberalism (aka There Is No Alternative (TINA) – Margaret Thatcher).

  • A quiet Sunday at home.

    I decided to have a quiet Sunday at home – no drama, no going down to the store, just enjoying the vibe and working on my garden. Mum came around to drop off some extra plants which has added some extra greenery to the backyard although I am still working on a bigger project. What I’d like to do is get some railway sleepers and build up a box then inside that box I have a concrete planter that is lifted up for drainage so then it possible to have some sort of hedging growing along where the fence is or maybe grow some tomato plants or something else. The downside is that the location of where the sun comes in I don’t think anything will grow so maybe the artificial hedge would be the better solution which would hide the ugliness of the fence.

    I was reading through Arstechnica as a follow up to a post I made regarding the performance of the YouTube app on the Apple TV 4K along with the performance of tvOS 26.2 in general to see whether others have experienced similar issues – it appears that it isn’t an isolated incident. I then am reminded of an issue that was raised recently regarding the CPU hogging nature of the YouTube website (link) because of a service worker in the background. It is interesting though that it has been a week since the issue has appeared and the reason why I was interested is because even with reduced transparency enabled I was still getting stuttering an unresponsive experience so I assumed based on the evidence that maybe something more was going on than just user interface maybe is not as well optimised on the Apple TV 4K as it should be.

    I’ve since reenabled transparency on my Apple TV 4K and I haven’t noticed performance issues coming back which makes me wonder Google has done something to the website because the YouTube app I nothing more than a front end to the YouTube TV website so it could be possible that Google has made a change to correct the above issue (as reported on Reddit) which is why it is now working. I’m going to keep an eye on it but it is one of those things with technology given that there are so many moving parts it is difficult to nail it down to one thing that could be causing the problem because there maybe more than one contributing factor. In the case of Apple TV 4K, it could be that the user interface isn’t optimised but the problem is made worse by a framework that the app depends on having a bug or a performance regression.

    The fact that here was someone else on Arstechnica pointing out a similar issue with the HBO Max app (which makes use of Webkit) tells me that there is a common thread and maybe what Google did with the YouTube website was work around the problem but a more permanent solution will appear in maybe tvOS 26.3 or 26.4. I’ve had a look at Safari Technology Preview 234 (link) and it appears that some improvements that may make their way into 26.4 which should hopefully improve responsiveness.

  • A productive day.

    Today was productive, after getting all that I needed at Bunnings and The Warehouse I popped into the local Pak ‘n Save to pick up some shopping (chicken wings, salad and a few other bits and pieces) and I also stocked up on some Pepsi Max 2L that was on special – take advantage of the low price when I can. I’m getting psychologically ready to get back to work on Wednesday next week but I’m going to enjoy the last remaining days, it kind of sucks that holidays are never long enough but I guess the benefit of working, apart from the money of course, is how good the holidays feel once you get to it. In 2026 I’ll end up having maybe a couple of weeks off in June during WWDC and hopefully next year it won’t be wall to wall AI fetishisation because they would have learnt from from the backlash Microsoft experience with their whole ‘agentic OS’ nonsense not to mention the building resentment that even normies have adopted over the last year.

    I’m gradually working through an interesting video that popped up in my subscription feed:

    The one thing I keep reminding people is that Tik Tok, Facebook, Instagram, X/Twitter etc. aren’t the real world. A noise maker on one of these platforms throwing a temper tantrum amount something they don’t like does not represent the centre left or more broadly the left in general. We really do need to stop giving oxygen to this new generation of secular puritans whose online performativeness does nothing to advance social progress (or in fact makes it more difficult for marginalised groups to have their voice heard) other than for those people to gain social clout and chase that almighty dollar. Btw, on a side note, if your ‘allyship’ amounts to speaking over the very people you claim you’re trying to advocate for then maybe you should take seat because it is clear you’re not interested in helping but rather using those marginalised communities as a way to raise your profile at the expense of the very communities you claim you want to fight for.

    The other part is this cancel culture regarding these ‘online Karens’ who dig up something someone posted on a social media platform from 10-15 years ago and that person has moved beyond holding that position. One thing that it is important to note – someone saying, “I went to xyz show and I found that the jokes they made were rather tired old material” isn’t someone trying to ‘cancel’ you but rather they’re simply giving their opinion on something they experienced. I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news but people are allowed to have opinions and if they don’t like something then they’re entitled to tell the world that they went to something or did something but didn’t enjoy it.

    Getting back to ‘online Karens’, at the end of the day they only have power if we as a society give them power and as so long as big institutions convince themselves that these noise makers online represent a force in the real world then don’t be surprised that at extreme minority have an outsized voice. If the institutions such as media companies just said, “no, we’re going to have xyz do this particular awards show and if you don’t like it then tough toenails” and enough institutions held the line then eventually the ‘online Karens’ would realise that their temper tantrums and empty threats don’t carry any weight.

    The thing I keep reminding people is this, such noise makers online do not represent the real world and don’t represent normal people. The vast, vast, vast overwhelming majority of people aren’t interested in the online drama, they’re raising their kids, helping out at their local soup kitchen, going to their local church/mosque/synagogue once a week, they help out at their local school etc. they aren’t involved in this online nonsense and it wold serve their institutions well to stop allowing themselves to be convinced that idiots posting online represent any more than the squeakiest wheel demanding some oil.

    As for comedians, the biggest let down as far as I see it are the number of comedians who now suck up to those in power – rather than being the outsider looking in and criticising the system, what we’ve seen is an army of grifters from both on the left and right more concerned about sucking up to those in power for the sake of clout rather than being a practitioner of their craft. I remember years ago the worst thing a comedian could be called would be a ‘sell out’ – a comedian who sold out their principles so that they could align themselves to those in power or sold out to ‘the man’ such as doing any ad for a multi billion dollar corporation. The comedian was meant to be the rebel, the truth teller that was willing to speak to truth to power, to punch up rather than punch down.

    On a side note, if you don’t like a comedian, just don’t watch it – the same answer that those of us on the left gave the social conservative ‘family values’ types when they whined about a television show and we told them to change the channel if they don’t like it. No one is forcing you to watch it, if you don’t like the show then don’t watch it, if you don’t like that comedian then don’t attend their show – the power is in your hands. There are plenty of things I don’t like in my life but I don’t spend time making a video in an attempt to rally like minded people on Tik Tok to pressure x business to drop y show from their schedule.

  • A good start to building a relaxing backyard.

    I went down the road with mum to pick up some furniture and plants for my backyard then did some grocery shopping on the way back home. Once back at home I unpacked everything and mum helped me get the pot plants setup. Below are two photos of where things are so far:

    What I’d like to eventually do is make the fence a lot more presentable – I’m unsure whether I should replace it with a colour steel or whether I’m better off maybe putting up a fake hedge cover over it which will avoid having to do major work (link). With that being said, the side fences also need to be sorted out along with getting more plants – I’m looking at getting some long planter boxes then maybe some railway sleepers to kind of it in with a pebble bed underneath it.

    The other big focus is getting some shade over the sitting area – I’ve had a look through Bunnings and it appears that there are kit sets where one can setup a gazebo to cover the area while still making sure the space is open. One of the benefits of having such a setup will mean that on days when I need to dry my clothes I can put it on a clothes rack sitting outside even if the weather isn’t necessarily good. The choice is either getting a bespoke one or getting one that will need a few tweaks – in the meantime I may end up just getting a umbrella or a temporary gazebo that I can put up and leave up but take it down when there are high winds.

  • Happy Boxing Day.

    I decided to have a quiet time at home on Boxing Day after the excesses of Christmas Day – lots of food and sweets however it did feel a bit overwhelming so I’ve spent today at home unwinding, went for a quiet walk around the block a few times to get some fresh air once the rain stopped. On Saturday I’ll have a look at some outside seating along with some pot plants to make the backyard more inviting particularly on my day off from work where I can spend the time outside using my laptop rather than stuck inside. While I’m at the store I’ll have a look to see if there are any options for some sort of shade even if it is a temporary form of shade that I’ll need to put away in the garden shed.

    When it comes to the garden shed, the one I’ve got is a cheap one where as what I’d like to get is something that is a bit more robust and I’m also looking at maybe getting an e-bike with enough space that it can carry shopping (something like a cargo bike would be nice). Although they’re more expensive than a 50cc scooter there is the benefit of not having to pay for registration and from what I understand for insurance purposes it comes under ‘home and contents’ like an ordinary push bike rather than it having to have a separate insurance policy. The sort of shed I’ll get will be based on the dimensions of the bike that I’m looking at getting so that it can fit inside but from what I understand the battery is removable so it is possible to recharge the battery inside.

    With the lead up to the new year the big focus by me has been on making small lifestyle changes that I can carry over to the new year – call it a running start rather than starting new resolutions from a standing start which doesn’t have the benefit of built up momentum. The thing I’ve been doing for the last week is asking myself “am I hungry or am I just bored” before going to have something to eat. It is easy to get stuck in a cycle of eating just to fill up time or associating an activity with eating eg I’m going to watch a movie so therefore I should have something to nibble on, rather than asking whether I’m doing it out of habit because that is what I’ve always done or is it because I’m genuinely hungry.

    I think that good amount of my weight gain in the past it has been due to ‘unconscious eating’ where I’ll just go through the day on autopilot not really asking myself “but do I really need it because I am hungry or am I doing it because I’m bored and need to keep myself occupied by doing something?”. It isn’t about depriving oneself of enjoyment but rather asking whether this is something that I am consciously engaging in or am I just on autopilot and going through the motions. It is early days but I’m hoping that if I stick to it then eventually it’ll become an ingrained habit that becomes an default setting rather than having to consciously thinking about it.