Week 19/2026: It’s autumn

Week of 4 May 2026

It’s autumn.

This post is wholly researched and written by me. I do not use AI in my writing. I will always bring you my stories in my real human voice.

It’s autumn

It’s autumn. The leaves are out.

The moon is out.

On the other side of the world, it’s spring and the baby peregrine falcons at Salisbury Cathedral are growing.

It was Mothers Day on Sunday and I had a lovely conversation with Kramstable.

This was a cute post from the Handfish Conservation Project.

Habit tracker

• 15 minutes morning exercise sequence (7 days): 6/7
• Hip or shoulder sequence exercises (5 days): 1/5
• Walk (7 days): 5/7
• Thinking time (4 days): 0/4
• Morning planning routine (4 days): 0/4
• Mid-day journalling (7 days): 1/7
• Work shutdown (4 days): 0/4
• 9.30 shutdown (6 days): 4/6
• Evening routine (7 days): 7/7

Physio exercises

• Calf exercises (7 days): 7/7
• Hip lifts (7 days): 6/7
• Sliding bridge (7 days): 4/7

Summary of the week

The best thing

Chatting with Kramstable on Mothers Day.

This week I learned

I fell down a Little Shop of Horrors rabbit hole (thanks uni) and I learned that its writers Alan Menkin and Howard Ashman also wrote The Little Mermaid and the song “Part of Your World” is almost exactly the same song as “Somewhere That’s Green” from Little Shop. (Alan Menkin said that when they wrote “Part of Your World” they jokingly called it “Somewhere That’s Wet”.)

This week I noticed

New lines painted on Elizabeth Street near Macquarie Street.

Light on the back of 36 Davey Street.

What the hell is a ‘forward deployed AI accelerator’? Do I even want to know?

(The only reason I found this was because I accidentally activated that annoying MSN thing that comes up on the side of your Windows taskbar. I do not want that feature full of clickbait news stories. I turned it off.)

This scene.

Mouse car!

The lutenist on Doctor Who The King’s Demons (1983) was Jakob Lindberg, who has just done a concert with Van Diemen’s Band.

What’s making me think?

I’m sick of AI being shoved into everything and having to deliberately opt out of it. I’m sick of AI fakes, AI feeding off itself and creating AI copies of copies of stuff.

I’ll be left behind? Great! I don’t want to go there. There is so much to learn in the world, so many fascinating things to explore and experience and feel and connect with. Why mess it up and ‘augment’ it with AI? Just . . . don’t. We have enough right now. Go look at some stars or birds or trees or insects or paintings or buildings or something. Embrace the wonder that is already here.

Also, this from author Matt Haig:

The paradox is that the people who demand you be proud of your country are the ones that make you ashamed of it.

Reading

• The Psychobiotic Revolution: Mood, Food and the New Science of the Gut-Brain Connection by Scott C. Anderson
• Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare

Listening

• Dreamworld by Pet Shop Boys
• Pet Shop Boys Discovery: Live in Rio De Janeiro
• Little Shop of Horrors 1982 Original Cast Album

Watching

• Resident Alien
• Doctor Who ‘The King’s Demons’