Will it be counted?

I’ve voted in the 2024 USA’s federal elections, as I always do, but I don’t know for sure that my ballot will be counted. There are several different reasons for that, but all of them have the same cause: Republicans. The party that once liked to call itself “The Party of Lincoln” has now positioned itself as an enemy of democracy, and voters like me are in the party’s crosshairs.

US citizens living overseas indefinitely are entitled to vote in federal elections, just like US military personnel stationed overseas can. US citizens living overseas temporarily, like workers on a short-term assignment from their US employer, or those attending school overseas, would most likely apply for a standard absentee ballot. However, US citizens who are living overseas indefinitely (like me), register through a state-administered federal system, using the Federal Post Card Application (FPCA) to register and get a ballot. The FPCA forms require a Social Security number, the number of one’s state Driver license or state ID. Many US citizens living overseas indefinitely won’t have a state driver license or ID card, so providing them isn’t mandatory (it’s probably there to establish ongoing state residency for folks that applies to). All applicants also provide the address where they were last registered to vote. The organisation “Vote from Abroad” has a good explanation of what a “US voting address” is on their website:

As a US citizen living abroad, your “voting address” is the street address of the last place you lived in the US. This general rule applies even if your family no longer owns the property, or you no longer have ties to the state, or you don't intend to return to that address or that state, or if it no longer exists as a residence. It also doesn't matter if you were ever registered to vote at that address.

If you are a US citizen who has never lived in the US, your “voting address” is the street address of the last place your US citizen parent (or spouse) lived in the US. If both of your parents are US citizens, you may use the last US address of either one.

The Republican presidential candidate has been whining constantly about mail-in voting of all kinds, and has repeatedly demanded it be ended (which won’t happen because it would harm Republicans, too), and lately his target has been to demand that no mail-in votes be counted after Election Day. He recently talked yet again (again) about suing to end mail-in voting [this was discussed by Democracy Docket’s Marc Elias and Brian Tyler Cohen on a recent episode of their “Democracy Watch” YouTube series].

This gets at MAGA Republicans’ first attempt to destroy voting by mail: Their hand-picked Postmaster General, who has done everything in his power to destroy postal delivery efficiency and timeliness, something Republicans want because it would mean that completed postal ballots may take too long to be delivered to the various states’ election authorities, just as MAGAts want.

Right now, many US states, including my native Illinois (which is, of course, the place of my own FPCA registration and voting) accept and count all postal ballots postmarked on or before Election Day that are received with a certain number of days after Election day. This long-standing programme has become a particular target of Republicans.

In Illinois, ballots—again, postmarked on or before Election Day—will be counted if they’re received within 14 days after Election Day. On May 25, 2022, a lawsuit, Bost v. Illinois State Board of Elections was filed on behalf of three Republicans, including US Representative Mike Bost (R-IL12), who was one of 126 Republican US Representatives to sign an amicus brief in support of Texas v. Pennsylvania, the infamous and idiotic MAGA lawsuit filed with the US Supreme Court contesting the results of the 2020 presidential election in another state—one they donb’t even fucking live in. It was surely one of the most utterly bizarre and offensive legal stunts MAGA Republican politicians pulled, apart from every other suit filed by the Republican loser’s team of misfits and ne’re do wells. Then, January 6, when so many of them tried to stop the certification of the election and install the Republican candidate as president, even though he lost the election, was lightyears worse.

The Republicans’ Illinois lawsuit argued that federal law requires all US states to hold Election Day on the first Tuesday in November, but Illinois allowing mail-in ballots to be received and counted for up to two weeks after Election Day effectively extended Election Day and, because of that, they bizarrely claimed that votes on Election Day are “diluted by illegal ballots received in violation of the federal Election Day statutes.” Ballots from US Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to vote, Republocans claimed, somehow magically “diluted” other citizens’ votes, because—who know why?! It’s always best to not explore Republicans’ very weird fantasies. The case was dismissed by the District Court, not on merit, but because of a lack of jurisdiction. The Republicans appealed to the 7th US Circuit Court of Appeals, but they upheld the District Court dismissal on August 21, 2024. This means the 14-days after Election Day deadline remains—for now.

Meanwhile, Republicans also targeted Mississippi’s law, which has a deadline of 5 business days after Election day for mail-in ballots to be received. On January 26, 2024, the Republican National Committee (RNC), along with local Republicans, filed a suit, Republican National Committee v. Wetzel, making the same arguments they made in the Illinois case, but they also claimed that the extended deadline for mail-in ballots to be received somehow magically violated their right to vote under the 14th Amendment, because, Republicans, or something. A summary judgement on July 28, 2024 reaffirmed the exisiting Mississippi deadline.

The Republicans then announced their intention to appeal to the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals, the most conservative—and arguably the most MAGA—in the entire country. We know the RNC did this precisely so that whichever way the court ruled, the loser—either the RNC or the Republican officials in Mississippi if they lost—could ultimately appeal the case to the Republican US Supreme Court, with the (probably) justified hope that the far-right Republican Majority will rule to help their shared party by outlawing the long-established precedent of counting mail-in ballots received before the state’s legislated deadline. In fact, the Republican-controlled Mississippi state legislature offered to repeal the law, but the RNC ordered them not to do that so they could get their Supreme Court to help them.

If the Republican Supreme Court does outlaw the counting of mail-in ballots received after Election Day, it, together with Republicans’ attempts to destroy the US Postal Service, will directly affect overseas voters like me. That’s because the attacks on the postal service mean it’s questionable whether a mail-in ballot sent from overseas has any chance of arriving by, let alone before, Election Day (no matter when it’s posted), so taking away the extra days many states permit may make it even more likely that the votes of overseas citizens won’t be counted—which is exactly what the Republican Party and its Dear Leader want.

There are a handful of other options for longterm overseas citizens. Some states allow other means of submitting ballots, including sending them by fax or other electronic means (Republicans will definitely challenge those methods, too). Overseas citizens can drop off their ballots to a US diplomatic post, providing the envelope has the correct postage on it, and the staff will put the ballots in a “diplomatic pouch” to send to the USA, where they’ll be sent to the postal service. This method may cut a few days off the mailing time, however, it could mean a special trip. For example, NZ has two US diplomatic posts, the Embassy in Wellington, and Consulate in Auckland, so I, too, might have to make a special trip (I’ve heard, though, that ballots can be couriered to a diplomatic post, though I haven’t personally verified that).

Another possible option might be to use a courier service, which Illinois law allows. However, it has special requirements, apparently around federal licensing, which usually means major companies. Of the ones I know are acceptable, the only one I know for sure is still operating in New Zealand is FedEx, but as far as I know their only facility in New Zealand is at Auckland International Airport, and there’s no other option for collection. In the past, NZ Post had an arrangement with DHL who were their US partner for document deliveries in the USA. I didn’t know that wasn’t the case anymore until 2020 when I went to send my ballot by courier, and the carrier was a company I’d never heard of. I know the ballot was delivered to Chicago, but I never got a confirmation email that it was counted, so I don’t know whether or not it was. On the other hand, maybe they stopped sending the emails after 2016.

So, regardless of what happens with the RNC’s court stunts, I have no idea whether my ballot will arrive in Chicago in time to be counted, or whether or not it will be counted if it does. This doesn’t matter in that Illinois is a solidly Democratic state, and Harris-Walz will carry Illinois—everyone knows that. There’s no US Senate election this year, so the only other federal office I got to vote for was US Representative, and the incumbent Democrat will win that race. My vote, then, technically isn’t needed—but it was never about that: It’s my duty to vote. It’s my values in action, along with my commitment to democracy, neither of which would ever permit me to sit out this election—or to vote for anyone other than Harris-Walz. I hope most Americans are the same.

I also hope this isn’t the last election Americans will ever have, because if the Republicans win, it’s game over. Sorry I have no hopeful words, that's just it. Vote.

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 15

On October 13, 1984, a new song went to Number One: ”I Just Called to Say I Love You” (audio-only video up top, about which, more later) by American singer/songwriter/producer Stevie Wonder began its three week run at Number One on the Billboard “Hot 100”. The song was the lead single from the 1984 movie soundtrack album, The Woman in Red, which was the second Number One in a row to feature in a movie. It was Stevie Wonder’s biggest hit overall, not the least because it went to Number One in many countries (including his first Number One in the UK), and it won a Golden Globe and an Oscar for “Best Original Song” from a movie.

The video above is from Wonder’s official YouTube Channel, and that makes it more likely to remain available long-term. Unofficial videos are far more likely to be taken down, which is a problem for blog posts like this one. However, there was an official music video, about which the Wikipedia article for the song (linked to above) says:

A music video of the song has Wonder, during a concert, singing into a telephone receiver while seated at a piano. By the end of the song, he and the audience are standing and swaying to the music. The video features concert footage recorded in Rotterdam Ahoy, in the Netherlands, on August 10, 1984.

I don’t remember whether I saw the official video at the time—which, of course, doesn’t mean that I didn’t see it. After all, the song was a huge hit, and so I could well have seen it. However, the official video, if that's what it is, was difficult to find on YouTube, though I eventually found one that appears to be it. I’ve included it at the very end of this post in case the video is taken down at some point.

I never saw the film The Woman in Red, and I’m not sure whether I knew at the time that this song was used in the film—maybe I did? It wouldn’t have mattered to me either way, though, since I wasn’t interested in the movie. It’s a little unusual for music videos for songs from movies to not use any footage from the film it was in, but that wasn’t unheard of, either, of course.

Now, about the song itself. I have to be brutally honest here: I never liked this song. I found the melody bland and soporific, at least in part because in that era I liked uptempo music. I also absolutely loathed the way the song ends, though I couldn’t articulate why it bothered me so much. My reaction to it wasn’t improved by advertisers using it in far too many sappy, and even twee, TV commercials over the years, removing the emotional resonance that was in the original song and reducing it to what would now be called cringe.

Having said all of that, it was really just that one song. I’ve liked a lot of Wonder’s work over the years, especially, his legendary 1976 album, Songs in the Key of Life. This song simply was not one I liked, and, despite how it may sound, I didn't hate it, either.

All up, “I Just Called to Say I Love You” topped 19 charts, and among the national charts for countries I write about, it reached Number One in Australia, Canada (3x Platinum), New Zealand (Gold), and the UK (Platinum), as well as Number One on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100”, “Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs”, and “Adult Contemporary” charts, and was also Number One on the Cash Box “Top 100” chart. It was certified Gold in the USA.

The soundtrack album The Woman in Red reached Number 4 in Australia, Canada (2x Platinum), and New Zealand (Gold), Number 2 in the UK (Platinum), and Number 4 on the USA’s “Billboard 200” chart. It was Certified Platinum in the USA.

This series will return November 3 with the next Number One song of 1984.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1984” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 1 – January 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 2 – February 4, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 3 – February 25, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 4 – March 31, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 5 – April 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 6 – May 12, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 7 – May 26, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 8 – June 9, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 9 – June 23, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 10 – July 7, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 11 – August 11, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 12 – September 1, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 13 – September 22, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 14 – September 29, 2024

New Zealand is changing

The 2023 New Zealand Census data that I’ve been waiting for has finally been released, and to statistics and demographics nerds like me, it’s utterly fascinating. To avoid burying the lede, New Zealand is finally majority non-religious. I’ve written about that subject several times over the years, and have always said this was inevitable.

This is the way Statistics NZ reported the change:

For the first time since the New Zealand census began to collect religious affiliation, over half of the census usually resident population had no religion at the time of the 2023 Census. The proportion of people with ‘No religion’ steadily increased from 41.9 percent (1,635,348) in 2013, to 48.2 percent (2,264,601) in 2018, and 51.6 percent (2,576,049) in 2023.

That’s an increase of ten points over a decade, but it was a slow change. This is the point where I always point out that “no religion” means precisely that: While it includes the categories atheist and agnostic, it also includes those who have “nothing in particular”. The only thing we know for sure about these people—which, full disclosure, is the category I chose for myself—is that we aren’t part of any organised religion. The stats for religious identification are also changing:

The three largest religious groupings in 2023 were:

• Christian – 1,614,636 people (down 102,543) or 32.3 percent of the total population, compared with 36.5 percent in 2018
• Hindu – 144,753 people (up 21,369) or 2.9 percent compared with 2.6 percent in 2018
• Islam – 75,138 people (up 14,517) or 1.5 percent compared with 1.3 percent in 2018.

I think that the small increase in those choosing Hindu or Islam is probably because of immigration (though that might take deeper analysis to confirm), but it’s fascinating that less than a third of New Zealanders identify as Christian—this in a country once heavily dominated by those identifying as Christian.

New Zealand has actually been a secular nation for a very long time, even when religious identification was still a majority (in other words, 2018 and earlier). In my personal experience, most New Zealanders don’t like having religion shoved in their faces, so much so that door-to-door proselytisers, and pretty much any insistent religious person, is likely to be called a “god botherer” (though not to their faces…) by ordinary Kiwis—even including many of those who identify as Christian. Basically, Kiwis want to be left alone.

The 2023 Census was the first to ask people about their gender, sexual identity, and whether they were born with a variation of sex characteristics. The results showed that around 1 in 20 adults belonged to Rainbow or LGBTIQ+ communities. Wellington has the highest percentage (11.3 percent) of LGBTIQ+ residents, Dunedin was second (with 7.3 percent), then Christchurch (6.0 percent), Palmerston North (5.8 percent), and Hamilton (5.6 percent). Auckland, by far New Zealand’s largest city, had a lower percentage of people who belonged to the LGBTIQ+ population (4.9 percent) than Hamilton has, which surprised me. Within Auckland local board areas, Waitematā, which is mainly the central city, including some historically LGBTIQ+ suburbs (neighbourhoods), had the highest proportion of LGBTIQ+ adults, with 12 percent. [For more detailed information, see “2023 Census shows 1 in 20 adults belong to Aotearoa New Zealand’s LGBTIQ+ population”].

Here are a few random facts I thought were interesting:

• In 2023, 22.5 percent of the population was 60 years and over, and 18.7 percent were children under 15 years. These proportions were 20.8 and 19.6 percent respectivelyin 2018. Also, the average number of children born to each female aged 15 years and over was 1.6, down from 1.7 children in 2018 and 1.8 in 2013. Taken together, this shows why immigration will continue to be important for New Zealand if it is to cope with an aging population and declining numbers of New Zealand-born young people to support them.

• Almost 30 percent of usual residents were born overseas. The most common overseas birthplaces in 2023 were: England at 4.2 percent of the total population (208,428 people), People’s Republic of China at 2.9 percent (145,371 people), and India at 2.9 percent (142,920 people). 31,779 people in New Zealand were born in the United States. The number of people born in the Philippines increased from 37,299 people (0.9 percent) in 2013 to 99,264 (2.0 percent) in 2023. Not all of these foreign-born people are citizens or even necessarily permanent residents—they’re merely “usually resident”, and may be on work permits and visas. [For more detailed information, see “Census results reflect Aotearoa New Zealand’s diversity”, which also includes information on languages spoken and ethnicity].

• Around two-thirds of households in New Zealand (1,175,217 or 66.0 percent) now own their home, compared with 64.5 percent in 2018. Stats NZ principal analyst, Rosemary Goodyear, noted that, “This increase in home ownership, although small, is a reversal of the falling rates we have seen since home ownership peaked in the early 1990s.” However, home ownership is lowest in Auckland (59.5 percent), probably in part because it has some of the highest house prices in the country.

• About two-thirds of private dwellings (66.8 percent) had heat pumps in 2023, compared with just under half (47.3 percent) in 2018. That’s a huge increase, and that makes homes warmer and drier, but their energy efficiency makes the increase good new for the country. 

• Landline telephones are rapidly declining in use. In 2023, 31.0 percent of households had a landline, down from 62.5 percent in the 2018 Census. I don’t know if they have a way to track VOIP phones (what I have), which are internet-based but use traditional “landline” phone numbers.

Every time I look at newly-released census statistics, I always find things I think are interesting, and there was obviously far more in the press releases than I’ve shared here. Eventually I’ll look at the raw data to see if the answers to any of my questions are there, or can be extrapolated from the data that is there. But that’s a job for the future. Right now, though, it’s like Christmas for statistics and demographics nerds like me. Hooray!

More information on any of these census statistics can be found in the links above. Also, “Home ownership increases and housing quality improves” has data about housing, including the last three points on my random facts list.

Another new month will bring, um…

It’s now October! This year has been flying past, although lots of people feel that the passage of time seems to speed up as we get older. In any event, each new month brings a perfect time to reassess, redirect, recommit—in short, every month we get the chance to change course.

Another paragraph goes here.

It’s been difficult for me to commit to this blog this year—obviously. The had been a challenging year, which I’ve talked about several times now. I’ve also recently made a change in the way I’m doing things that I have yet to talk about, but it will shape the course of this month and many more to come.

In the meantime, though, now that we’ve entered the last calendar quarter of 2024, this is a particularly good point to look at my blogging (lack of) progress this year. The numbers of posts tell the story, however, as of October 1, the total number of posts rose to 124, which is three more than in my very first blogging year (2006)—except that I only blogged for the last three and half months of that year. Nevertheless, it counts! 2024 is not my worst-ever blogging year!

I thought that this year’s number of posts by month (visible along the right side of this blog) was interesting. The rankings to October 1 are: 1= January and April (23 each), 3. February (16), 4. March (14), 5. September (13), 6. May (12), 7. June (9), 8= July and August (7 each).

Because I’m me, I worked it out, and with 92 days left in this year (October 1 though December 31), I’d have to produce an average of 2.62 posts per day to hit my old goal of an average of one post per day over the year. That’s unlikely, to put it mildly. Even reaching my 2019 total of 263 posts would require an average of 1.51 posts per day. 2019 was, of course, the year that changed everything about my life, and nothing has been the same since, and for that reason in particular breaking that total is my dream goal for this year. However, my realistic stretch goal for 2024 is 238 or more, which would beat my 2021 total of 237, and it would also require an average of 1.2 posts per day for the rest of the year. I think that’s achievable. At the very least, I want more than 205 posts (my 2020 total).

Obviously, I’ve never given up hope that one day I might return to achieving one post per day over the year, and while that’s not going to happen this year, I should at least do better than several other of my “worst ever” years. This matters to me, first, because I’m highly competitive with myself, but also because so much has seemed so beyond my control this year that I want to work on regaining control of some of the things I seemed to have lost in 2019, and blogging is, theoretically, one of the of the things I can regain control over.

Blogging is not the only thing I want to regain control of. There’s my podcast, too—and I know for sure that’s about to return. This month marks 8 years since I last made and posted a YouTube video, something I never intended to stop doing, but, as with everything else, changes in my life got in the way. Someday I’d like to bring that back, too.

Having said all that, and having talked about my ambitious goals I’ve set, I’m also okay with the very real possibility that I won’t meet any of my goals. After all, this is the third day of this new month, and I’ve already missed two days of blogging. The past five years have taught me to be relaxed about where my blogging totals end up, precisely because I’ve always missed days. Besides, learning to let go of goals is just as important as having some in teh first place.

Still, even I’m curious to see what happens—or doesn’t. Of course.

Small and orderly

I’ve done a lot of projects in this house since moving day on January 22. 2020. Most of those projects haven't been particularly big, but a few have been very small. This month, I completed another small project—sort of accidentally.

Back in February I spent about a week on some very small projects, which I mentioned here only in June when I completed another small project: Installing a shaving mirror in the en suite. My ptoject this month was a little more involved than that mirror: I reorganised my fridge (Before and After photos up top).

The project actually technically began back in May when I bought an acrylic turntable with sides to store bottles in my fridge. I knew I needed to wash it before I put it in the fridge, and I didn’t get to that. Then I moved it to the other side of the kitchen to get it out of my way. Then, of course, I forgot all about it, as I so often do.

I decided to have the Hamilton family around for dinner on Friday, September 20, since it happened to be the fifth horrible anniversary since Nigel died. I knew I’d be fine, but it seemed like getting together with the family was the best thing to do on that particular day.

However, my house was a disaster area, the living area in particular, because of the stuff I brought in from the garage as part of the latest incarnation of that project, which I wrote about back in July. Getting the house ready meant clearing out all the stuff (and also sparked a new approach to the garage project, a whole topic on its own). I spent a couple weeks working on it a bit at a time, and when I was working in the kitchen I finally saw the acrylic turntable. I washed it and left it to dry while I started on the inside the fridge.

First, I took everything off the two top shelves, then removed the glass shelves so I could wash them in the sink. I don’t think I’ve done that since my niece cleaned them the day I moved in (to be clear, when I have spills, which is rare, I clean them up immediately, and I have wiped the shelves from time to time; it’s just I haven’t taken them out to wash them). The lowest shelf it too difficult to remove, so I cleaned that in position.

Next, I went through everything I’d taken out (and what was on the door) to see if there were any science experiments, and there was one: A jar of something or other at the back of a lower shelf, in a spot difficult to see unless I bent over, and I found som some rearly sold raspberry jam that had become solid. There were some chutneys and relishes that smelled fine, but I was pretty sure they’d been in the fridge since before Nigel died. I emptied them and washed the jars and put them in the recycling that week.

I put the new acrylic turntable on the top shelf, then basically put things back where they had been. There wasn’t enough room to put the old lazy susan on the top shelf, so I put that aside while I carried on with the rest. A day or two later, I decided to put the old lazy susan on the second shelf, and I’d put the remaining chutneys and relishes, along with jam, onto it—but only after I took everything out again so I could raise the top shelf one notch so the old lazy susan would fit on the second shelf.

This, then, created a new problem: The moved top shelf was too high to fit the milk bottle on it. At first I laid it on a shelf, but I quickly found out the cap wasn’t tight enough to prevent it leaking. Actually, I found it out twice, because the first time I thought maybe I hadn’t tightened the lid enough. That wasn’t the problem.

The milk is now on the door, a place I stopped putting it because I saw a “food safety expert” on TV saying the door was too warm for milk. I also switched from a 3-litre bottle to a 2-litre bottle, which I go through faster, and so, it’ll have less time to go bad. Hopefully.

An unexpected bonus was that the second shelf now has enough vertical space that I can have a dozen eggs on top of another dozen eggs. I usually buy a new dozen when when I’m down to my last few, so it’s not uncommon for me to have two cartons in the fridge at once.

My fridge is now the most organised its ever been, the elderly products are gone, and I even ended up with lots of empty space, even though there’s actually not a dramatically smaller amount of stuff in there: It’s simply better organised.

The project started because I was tidying up the house for the family, and it ended up giving a clean, organised fridge. Everybody won! I may not have planned to do that project, but I’m glad I did it. I’ll take it as a good omen for my other projects to come.

Fed by experimenting

Up until maybe a year or two ago, I experimented with cooking quite a lot. I tried recipes cooking techniques that were new to me, and I even experimented with different ways to source food ingredients. For no particular reason, I just kind of stopped, something I realised only recently.

Back in September 2022, I tried making sushi for the first time, and that recently popped up in my Facebook “Memories”. That was something I’ve never attempted again—and I’ve never even thought about it very often. However, seeing that FB “Memory” reminded me that I haven’t really had any kitchen adventures in quite awhile, certainly nothing like I used to have. That changed this past weekend.

On Saturday, I decided to make myself brunch of poached eggs on smashed avocado, served on toasted bread I made in my breadmaker (photo above). The poached eggs were the experiment: I’ve written before about making them in a shallow pan of water and adding white vinegar to (supposedly) help the whites remain intact. That method allowed me to poach two eggs at once. Then, I tried the “whirlpool method”, in which boiling water in a pot is stirred rapidly with a spoon, the raw egg is dropped into the vortex, and the result is a nearly perfect poached egg—but I could only cook one at a time, which wasn’t ideal.

Then, TV changed everything.

I was watching a magazine-style show that had a story about how rough the hospitality industry in New Zealand has it at the moment. There was some video shot in a cafe kitchen, and I noticed the chef was standing next to a big pot of boiling water, and he was adding an egg to what appeared to be swirling water. The shot was very brief, but I wondered, first, if I saw what I thought I saw, and second, would that allow me to make two poached eggs at once?

This weekend was the time to try, so I got out a large pot I normally use to make homemade soup, got the water boiling, swirled the water, dropped in one egg, then dropped in the other—and they they were both perfect! Well, mostly: I think the eggs were too cool, and some of the white separated away, leaving the poached eggs smaller than they’d otherwise be.

I store my eggs in the fridge so they’re fresher longer, Cold eggs are fine for scrambled or fired eggs, but when I want poached eggs I take them out of the fridge and let them come up to room temperature, often cracking them into a small ramekin so they’ll warm a bit faster, but mostly so I can make sure the eggs an intact (if not, I make scrambles eggs instead). On Saturday, I was a bit too impatient, but they were still very nice.

Obviously this is not a new thing—the chef on TV really was making poached eggs in a large pot, and it must be quite common. The point is, I didn’t know it, and was willing to try it, and now I’ve changed my poached egg making technique again, to the best method yet.

The other point, of course, is that for the first time in ages I saw something I wanted to try, in this case a cooking method, and so I did it. Now, I want to gey back to trying new recipes, too. Maybe I’ll even revisit some, like making pizza base from scratch using my breadmaker to make the dough, something I last tried October 1, 2021. That’ll probably pop up in my Facebook “Memories” tomorrow, only a couple weeks after the “Memory” of making sushi from scratch. I guess I’ll add that to my list to try again, too.

Looks like my kitchen might be about to be a busy place again. Good.

Time for changes

New Zealand returned to Daylight Saving Time (NZDT) at 2am Sunday morning (which some people think of as Saturday night…). At the moment, the change just makes sunrise and sunset an hour later than they were on Saturday. However, the days are getting longer as we move toward summer, so the number of hours between the two will continue to increase until late December. All of which is good.

I’m not a big fan of seasonal clock changes, even though this one gave us an hour more of afternoon daylight right now. The reason I don’t like the time change is that as I’ve grown older, it’s taken me longer every year to adjust (presently a week or so, though the one in autumn is much worse…). In practical terms, this means I’m more tired and I’m grumpier than usual. But, as I joked on Facebook, “I know, I know: ‘Would we notice a difference?’”. Quite possibly not—it would depend on the day.

Last week was a particularly busy one, mainly because I needed to mow the lawns, which were overdue due to all the rainy days we’ve had in recent weeks. That same wetness also made the work extremely physically demanding, with the mower constantly nearly stalling on the thick, still pretty wet grass. I did that over two days, Wednesday and Thursday, but on Tuesday, I also gave Leo a bath (photos at the top of this post). He needs a grooming, but in the meantime I’m going to tidy up his fur a bit.

Friday, after three days of physical labour, I decided to go to the supermarket. Thursday evening, I toyed with the idea of ordering groceries for delivery, but hemmed and hawed, and decided I’d shop in person the next day. This was probably not the correct decision.

On Friday morning, I woke up early and my body said, “Look, I don’t care what you did the past few days: Six hours of sleep is FAR too much—get up ya lazy bastard”. I finally did after spending another half hour trying in vain to go back to sleep.

All of Friday, I felt like I’d been up for two days, so pretty much all I did that was the supermarket trip. After I got home, Leo and I had a long nap and we both felt better (well, Leo didn’t actually say that, but I’m pretty sure it makes him happy when I feel better…). I went to bed early that night, and Saturday night, too.

There was one time after I moved into this house where I stayed up specifically to see what my devices did at the moment of the time change. Unfortunately, I picked the September change and it went from 1:59 am to 3:00am, which didn’t look as weird as it might’ve going from 2:59am to 2:00am—but seeing that would mean I’d have had to stay up until 3am in the about-to-depart Daylight Saving Time, and, contrary to popular belief, and my chronotype being “Night Owl”, I’m seldom up that late. At any rate, seeing that September change was about as underwhelming when I was recorded the “leap second” for a brief 2015 video for my YouTube Channel. As it turns out, an international agreement has been reached to end “leap seconds” by 2035. There was no international agreement to stop posting videos to my Channel nearly eight years ago—life happened. Ironically, perhaps, the last video I posted (so far?) was also about time.

Frivolity aside, there’s work I need to do twice year: Change the time in several places. All of my “smart” devices (phone, computers, tablets) automatically change time, but my four wall clocks and non-smart appliances (my oven and microwave) don’t. I can’t be bothered changing the time on the time on my oven or microwave—not the least because I don’t where the manuals are and I don’t know how. For my four wall clocks, I took each clock off the wall to reset the time, and cleaned them at the same time, as I always do (something I wrote about last year).

As I mentioned in my post last year, the clock radio in my bedroom has a button to toggle between DST and ST, but, ironically, the only thing I use that clock for is for its projector function to display the time on the ceiling (Nigel and I stopped using alarms many, many years ago). However, at the last house both Nigel and I forgot how to do that, and we didn’t know where the manual was. Suddenly, Nigel fixed it, and when I asked him how he did it, he grinned and said, “it’s magic!”. That meant that when Nigel died, I didn’t know how to change to/from DST, so I did what Nigel had probably done: I looked it up online. The first time I had to do that, was the end of September 2019—just over two weeks after Nigel died. I’m kind of amazed that I was in any sort of shape to figure that out at that time.

At any rate, all my clocks are now correct, and I also checked the batteries in the smoke detectors, something I do periodically, and always when the clocks change—though I didn’t actually do that until today. This means that all my twice-yearly chores are now done. It’s about time.

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 14

A new song went to Number One this week in 1984: On September 29, 1984, ”Let's Go Crazy” (video up top) by American musician/singer/songwriter/produce /etc. Prince, together with his band, The Revolution, went to Number One, and it would stay there for two weeks. The song was the second single from Prince’s sixth studio album, Purple Rain, which was the soundtrack album for the film of the same name. It was Prince’s second Number One on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100” chart, a couple months after “Let’s Go Crazy” (the subject of Part 10 in this series) topped the charts, eventually becoming the Number One song of 1984.

There’s nothing about the music video on the Wikipedia article for the song (linked to above), but that’s no doubt because it’s basically taken from the film Purple Rain. This was fairly common for songs taken from movies, including Number One songs I’ve talked about previously. Nevertheless, the section of the song's Wikipedia titled ”Musical Style” talks about its relation to the film, and it's relevant to the visuals, too.

I remember seeing the film Purple Rain back in the day, probably rented on VHS tape. I liked the film, though it wasn’t one of my all-time favourites. The same could be said of the song “Let's Go Crazy”: I liked it well enough, but it wasn’t one of my favourites, including among songs by Prince. Because of all that, this song doesn’t connect with me with my life in that era—though there aren’t all that many 1984 Number One songs that did. In fact, many of the songs that resonated with me the most intensely at that time didn’t necessarily do well on the “Hot 100”, and that’s something that’s been true for pretty much my entire pop-music-listening life. Even so, I’m always pleased when the song I’m talking about isn’t one I disliked, because there have been plenty of those over the years, too.

“Let's Go Crazy” reached Number 10 in Australia, 2 in Canada, 13 in New Zealand, 7 in the UK (Silver), and Number One on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100”, “Dance Club Songs”, and “Hot Black Singles” charts, and Number 19 on Billboard’s “Mainstream Rock” chart. It was also certified Gold in the USA.

The album Purple Rain reached Number One in Australia (3x Platinum) and in Canada (6x Platinum), Number 2 in New Zealand (5x Platinum), Number 7 in the UK (2x Platinum), and Number One on the USA’s “Billboard 200” chart (13x Platinum). In 2016, the album charted again, hitting Number 5 in Australia, Number 7 in Canada, Number 4 in the UK, and Number 2 on the “Billboard 200” chart, as well as hitting Number One on their US “Soundtrack Albums” chart. A remastered version of the album was released in 2017 (the first of his albums to to be remastered), and hit Number 4 in the USA.

This series will return October 13 with the next Number One song of 1984. Will it be one I liked, loathed, or maybe somewhere in between? I haven’t written the post yet, so even I don’t know what answer that post will reveal.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1984” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 1 – January 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 2 – February 4, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 3 – February 25, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 4 – March 31, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 5 – April 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 6 – May 12, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 7 – May 26, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 8 – June 9, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 9 – June 23, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 10 – July 7, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 11 – August 11, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 12 – September 1, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 13 – September 22, 2024

A new season

According to some people, a new season just began, with the arrival of the September Equinox. However, there are many different different dates we can pin seasonal changes to. Turns out, that’s true for human seasons, too.

The September Equinox, also known as “Astronomical Spring”, arrived in New Zealand at 12:43am Monday morning (or, to some, Sunday night…). Metrological Spring, which is what we generally use in this part of the world, began on September firstAs if all that wasn’t confusing enough, there’s a third option: Solar seasons.

Yesterday, Stuff published “Spring has sprung: Understanding the four different season start dates”, which attempts to explain the differences in the various choices for when we declare seasons to begin. Solar Seasons, the article says, relate to relative daylight in each hemisphere, and are six weeks either side of a solstice. It doesn’t say if that’s also true for equinoxes, but, if it is, that would only account for 48 weeks—are the other four weeks a sort of Seasonal Interregnum?.

None of the choices relate to weather, of course, and we’ve had both mild and wintry days/nights since September first, and we still are. In fact, yesterday I had my windows open, but today is a bit less Spring-like.

Seasons relating to weather are the ones we humans may obsess about the most, but we also have seasons in our own lives, something artists frequently refer to in their work. This has something that’s been on my mind lately partly because of the actual seasonal changes, but I’ve been reflective about ever since Nigel died, and especially with the recent fifth “horrible anniversary” of Nigel’s death.

I think it would be more surprising if I wasn’t thinking about the seasons of my life, now that I’m a 65-year-old widower: What is life going to be like for me as I continue aging and face those challenges alone? This is a bigger topic all on its own, and one I’m still trying to wrap my head around, but it’s probably been most noticeable in my relationship to my own health.

Because my parents died when they were younger than I am now, I have no sense of what I may be in for, apart from the fact that since I never smoked, I’m unlikely to face the specific smoking-related health problems they had. Other than that, who knows? The fact that Nigel isn’t hear to help me navigate these uncharted waters makes this even more challenging—and sometimes even terrifying.

Yesterday, I went to see my doctor, the first time I’ve seen him in 2 year, 4 months because of Covid restrictions and the ongoing overwork that most doctors deal with every day because of a shortage of doctors and lack of proper government funding (in fact, the fee the practice charges for a standard 15-minute appointment recently went up 25% to help them cope with fast-rising costs). In the time since my last in-person appointment, I’ve traded secure messages with my doctor using the online patient portal, I had an in-person vitals check, I’ve had annual blood tests, and, of course, I always keep up my vaccinations. I mention all that because I do the ordinary things one does to remain healthy.

My specific complaints were about lightheadedness: I’ve sometimes tried to get out of bed in the morning and felt lightheaded. This is a common enough thing for people on blood pressure medication, however, that’s never happened to me before. Also, one day recently I had a massive head-rush as I walked across a supermarket carpark, something that passed quickly and had no other symptoms.

My doctor said the general lightheadedness was a symptom of getting older, though he didn’t put it like that. It was clearer to me because he mentioned that folks in their 80s often have trouble with the same thing—actually, even more so—but because the don’t have the core or muscle strength to keep themselves steady, they may fall. I know that his point in telling me that was there are natural changes that occur as we age, but this also inadvertently gave me a glimpse of something that may be ahead for me 20 years from now (give or take). It also made me realise I need to take my own fitness more seriously, and work on maintaining muscle mass and core strength—actually, “work on” is being generous: I need to start doing that.

What’s important at the moment is that I’m quite good at monitoring my own health. For example, my Apple Watch records my heart rate many times per day (speaking of which, no more atrial fibrillation!), I sometimes check my blood pressure, and I even check my blood oxygen levels sometimes. All of that is on top og regular things like annual blood tests, routine vaccinations, and even my willingness to contact my doctor if I’m concerned about something, especially things that seem to have changed.

While I’m monitoring my own health and how things are changing as I age, there’s something else about that: I’ve become more relaxed. I’ve written several times about how after Nigel died, I was worried I might die soon, too. Then, it became worry about something happening to me and Nigel not being here to help me—or just to talk me out of my latest health panic—though I wouldn’t be having panics if Nigel was there, of course.

Nowadays, I’m far more relaxed about everything, including, even, my own death. I understand far too well that death is inevitable, and while being good about my own health can help delay that, and possibly improve the quality of my life between now and then, there’s absolutely nothing anyone can do to stop death itself. That’s why I no longer worry about that.

All of this is part, maybe the most visible part, of my ageing and my move into new seasons. I still can’t even guess what my future seasons might be like, buy they’ll arrive whether I’m ready or not. I think that maybe the best any of is can do is to be sensible, keep our eyes open, and to stay grounded. Actually, there’s one more thing: We can try to find more moments of joy, regardless of the season, and that alone will improve literally everything else. It doesn’t matter what we call the seasons or how we mark their beginning or progress. Just like the seasons on our planet, really.

The photo up top is of the trees on my street, the only one I have a good view of out my front window. I took it on Sunday, around nine hours before the September Equinox arrived in New Zealand. Mainly, I was just excited to see the leaves emerging again—always a highlight Spring for me, what with the promise of warm weather to come. And yes, I've share several photos with this same tree in it.

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 13

Forty years ago today, a new song went to Number One, and it became the only Number One in 1984 to stay at the top of the chart for a single week. On September 22, 1984, the new Number One song was ”Missing You” (video up top) by English musician John Waite. The song, originally released in June 1984, was the first single from his second album, No Brakes. As I said in Part 12 of this series this was “a song that I frankly never think of when I think of 1984”, and I think part of it is that it was its one week at Number One—and there were a lot of big, dominant songs that year.

The song is about a man thinking about a distant lover who left, and he’s trying to pretend that “I ain't missing you at all”. At the time, I thought the song was a nice enough, even though I couldn’t personally relate to the lyrics—at the time; times change. It’s kind of funny to me that the song went Number One forty years ago today, because this past Friday was the fifth anniversary of my Nigel’s death. Over those five years there were definitely times I tried to lie to myself that I wasn’t still missing Nigel as keenly as in the aftermath of that horrible day in 2019. I wasn’t any more successful than Waite was in “Missing You”. I’m always interested in the way a pop song that I once didn’t feel any personal connection to when I first became aware of it can later—even much later—become very relevant indeed. That’s actually happened to me a lot over the past five years. I have a copy of the song on the 1984 CD in the Time-Life series of CDs of 1980s music called Sounds Of The Eighties. Because of that, I think I heard it more after 1984 than I did in the year.

The music video was written, directed, and produced by Kort Falkenberg III—whoever that is? It’s certainly not a name I’ve familiar with. In any case, it’s okay—not one of my favourites from that era, but also not one I disliked. A lot of 1984's mid-tempo/slower songs had similar looks in their videos, and I suppose that could be why it didn’t stand out for me at the time. In any event, it was pleasant enough.

“Missing You” reached Number 5 in Australia, 4 in Canada (Platinum), 18 in New Zealand, 9 in the UK (Silver), and Number One on the USA’s Billboard “Hot 100” and on the Billboard “Mainstream Rock” charts.

The album No Brakes reached Number 27 in Australia, 8 in Canada (Platinum), 64 in the UK, and 10 on the USA’s “Billboard 200” chart (Gold). It didn’t chart in New Zealand.

This series will return next week (!) with another new Number One, this time a song that I knew very well at the time. Only a week from now, huh? You won’t be missing me at all.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1984” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 1 – January 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 2 – February 4, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 3 – February 25, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 4 – March 31, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 5 – April 21, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 6 – May 12, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 7 – May 26, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 8 – June 9, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 9 – June 23, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 10 – July 7, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 11 – August 11, 2024
Weekend Diversion: 1984, Part 12 – September 1, 2024