Grandparenting – a true joy

Leave a reply

Grandparents, Grandparenting, Grandchildren

The Free Press wrote an article on  grandparenting. As I read it I thought about writing a post on grandparenting, which now occupies a large part of our life.

We are blessed to have 4 wonderful grandchildren, all of whom live, along with their parents no more than 30 minutes from our home.

Grandparenting is a topic amongst our friends. It’s a topic which isn’t restricted to our female friends at all. Infact, it’s a topic that is raised frequently with a close male friend of mine.  He very much lives for his grandchildren. My favourite Person and I might not go that far, but it’s a very big part of our lives.

We pretty much drop everything to help as needed, whether it’s to help our stay at home mum as she juggles pick ups and drop offs for her three, who are at different schools or our son as he and his wife juggle their work lives with parenting. Continue reading →

AI – To use it or not to use it, that is the question.

1 Reply
Deuces Museum Berlin

Early flight, from which there was no going back

I’ve been wrestling with AI.

Should I use it? How should I use it? When should I use it? Am I using someone else’s work without giving them credit? etc.

I get frustrated when I go through an AI chatbot when I’d just like to talk to a human. That’s been particularly frustrating recently, as I struggle to get my blog sorted after changing my hosting service package.

My dilemma all came to a head recently with my wonderful daughter, a creative, who is completely opposed to AI. She saw that I was looking at an AI adapted recipe. It needed to be adapted so I could use ingredients my favourite person could have.

My dilemma

Our quite heated argument made me completely question how I use AI.

Continue reading →

Writing travel reviews – It’s nice to be nice

2 Replies

Pantheon, Rome.

In early 2008, we were planning a European holiday, and I was trying to work out the best way to do it. We had a travel agent, but I wanted to do some research of my own. High on my list of priorities was my desire to follow a few stages of the Tour de France. Bluntly, I wanted to ‘Yell for Cadel’! We’d never had an Aussie winner, and I thought this was his year. It wasn’t, but he came close.

I was discussing our plans with friends, my bike riding buddy and his wife,  over dinner. They were much better travelled than we were, and I knew that my bike-riding buddy’s wife did all their travel planning and bookings herself. She pointed me towards TripAdvisor, which at the time I had never heard of.

That conversation changed my whole approach to travel. Continue reading →

Sport and Money – Is it like oil and water?

I am starting to wonder if money in sport is like oil and water; they just don’t mix.

I am a sports nut, but lately I’ve found myself losing some of that enthusiasm.

Over the last couple of weeks, I haven’t been checking the overnight EPL scores before getting out of bed. That might not sound significant, but for someone who’s followed Arsenal for years, it says something. One of the joys of retirement has been being able to watch a game at any time.

The Premier League trophy on display at the Emirates 😍🏆 🔴 @Arsenal

Source: Instagram

I’ve lost my enthusiasm for the EPL

In recent weeks, I haven’t had those disturbed nights watching Arsenal play in the early hours. It’s not because they are the Premier League Champions; it’s because I’ve lost some interest in the competition, largely because of the Manchester City situation.

For years, the 115 charges against City have been in the back of my mind, and sometimes front and centre. I like many have questioned their ownership and, more broadly, whether football clubs should have ownership closely aligned with nation states. I’ve even joked about Arsenal being owned by a plucky billionaire, as though that somehow makes things a little more acceptable.

But since the independent commission reached its judgement in the Manchester City case, I’ve felt deflated. I’ve still watched Arsenal’s games live when the timing has suited, given I live in Australia, or caught up on the replays. I haven’t bothered to watch other teams. Continue reading →

The Bathurst 1000: You can’t take the Blue Oval out of me

1 Reply
Badge "Ford" Oval

Source- rarespares.net.au

As the laps ticked away toward 161 in yesterday’s Bathurst 1000, I felt confident Anton De Pasquale would claim his first Bathurst crown in a Chevrolet Camaro. There were some rumblings about fuel that the commentators picked up on, but the team engineer played it cool, and the radio comms broadcast on TV were initially quite low-key about fuel saving, though they ramped up as the laps ticked by. A safety car late in the race seemed to alleviate the concerns, or so it seemed. Then, with victory all but guaranteed, disaster struck. De Pasquale’s car ran out of fuel on the final lap, and Brodie Kostecki swept past in his Dick Johnson Ford Mustang to take one of Bathurst’s most unlikely wins.

I was euphoric.

It reminded me of something the late Geoff Polites, a previous head of Ford Australia, said many years ago. Those of us of a certain age were born with either a Blue Oval for Ford or a Lion for General Motors Holden metaphorically tattooed on our backsides.

For me, it was always the Blue Oval. Continue reading →