Opportunities for change

Every once in a while, I come across an interesting story in a very indirect way, and it’s even better when it’s a topic I’m both insterested in, and that’s also timely. Creating green hydrogen in Australia using some Kiwi can-do is just the sort of thing I might not expect, particularly when it came by way of Facebook.

The video up top is from Australia’s “A Current Affair” programme from Channel Nine. The specific segment, abuot producing hydrogen in Australian using solar power, came to my attention because of a Facebook post by “I Fucking Love Australia”, an unabashedly lefty Facebook Page that often talks about politics, including the dire affect the USA’s Felon in Chief has on the world. The post was also published on the “IFLOZ” Substack, and it was on Substack that I saw the video.

I was interested in this story because I’ve said for years that producing green hydrogen should be a major focus for New Zealand. “Green hydrogen” production is carbon neutral because it’s made from water using solar, wind, or hydro electricity. When produced from fossil fuels, it’s usually called “blue hydrogen”, unless it’s made from coal gasification, when it’s called “brown hydrogen” because it’s usually made from lignite, aka “brown”, coal.

As you may be aware, New Zealand is surrounded by water, and we have ample sources of hydro, geothermal, and, increasingly, grid-scale solar power. The story in the video is about using hydrogen to make fertiliser, but they mention making it to be used as fuel, too. When hydirgen is burned, its byproduct is water vapor, not deadly gasses like fossil fuels produce. If NZ fully commited to hydrogen, we could be self-sufficient in carbon-neutral fertiliser AND fuel for our vehicles, and no idiotic war on the other side of the planet could affect our fuel and fertiliser ever again.

Australia, because of its size and suitability for solar power, could become an exporter of fertiliser from green hydrogen, and help the world turn its collective backs on the volatile Middle East while also helping other countries reduce their carbon emissions. There are so many wins.

There’s one final twist in the path to this particular story. This evening I checked Facebook and saw a post from the IFLOZ Facebook Page saying they were going to concentrate on Substack, where most of their content will be by subscription. They’re doing this, they say, because Facebook has been de-emphasising content from the political left, and that results in declining ad revenue for the content creators, and they had charts to back that up. They also suggested that Facebook is doing it because their future plans will require consent from the current US regime, and so they’re basically turning down the volume of the Left in order to avoid problems with the regime. Whatever the specific reason, many left-of-centre content creators on Facebook have complained about suddenly declining page views, and so, revenue. I have no idea whether the speculations about the motivations are correct or not, but given the current regime’s constant posturing against the First Amendment to the USA’s Constitution, the speculation is at least plausible.

Still, it’s always nice to run across a topic I’m intertested in, no matter how roundabout the course may be. Apparently I won’t have a repeat of this particular path, though. There’ll be others.

I’m a serial mind-changer

I sometimes change my mind (about any number of things) for reasons like better information, the price of something, or any number of other reasons. Every once in a while I’ll change my mind about something several times. Like about breakfast.

Back in June of last year, I wrote about bran cereal, because I tried a new (to me) one, but decided not to switch brands. However, I later decided that I would switch to the brand, and I talked about that in a follow-up post last November. I’ve now switched back to my original bran.

The fundamental reason for my switch back was the taste: I never actually liked it—it’s more more accurate to say that I tolerated the taste because of the cereal’s somewhat better nutritional profile. As I said last June:

There’s an irony here: Many people I know personally have screwed up their faces at the mere mention of All-Bran, declaring, "it tastes like cardboard", which made me wonder how they knew that. As it turned out, once I tried the Woolworth’s cereal, I understood: It’s not necessary to actually taste cardboard to get the sense that something must taste like cardboard would. To me, the High Fibre Bran was exactly like that

Irony maybe, but the taste never grew on me—in fact, the only actual flavour was the lemon yoghurt (maybe I should say the only pleasant flavour?). I recognised from the very beginning that “Just as I like All-Bran, which many people I know don’t like, it’s logical that other folks may love the High Fibre Bran cereal. To each their own.” Exactly.

In the November 2025 update post, I said:

I decided to continue to buy it—for now: If history is any indicator, it probably isn’t forever, because Woolworths has a habit of dropping it’s own home-brand products, though for all I know, they may just stop exporting them from Australia to New Zealand. In any event, it may not be around forever, but, for now, it’s my choice.

Woolworths has not (yet?) dropped the cereal, but I was nevertheless correct in guessing that “it probably isn’t forever”. I could get all philosophical and say “nothing is forever”, or wharever, but this is actually just about me changing my mind, then changing it again. Like I said: I'm a cereal—sorry, serial—mind-changer.

Important Note: The names of brands/products/companies listed in this post are all registered trademarks, and are used here for purposes of description and clarity. No company or entity provided any support or payment for this blog post, and all products were purchased by me at normal consumer prices. So, the opinions I expressed are my own genuinely held opinions, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the manufacturers, any retailer, or any known human being, alive or dead, real or corporate. Just so we’re clear.

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 6

 Forty years ago this week, on March 29, 1986, the new Number One song was “Rock Me Amadeus” (video up top) by Austrian musician Falco, the stage name of Johann "Hans" Hölzel. The song was the first single from Falso’s third studio album, “Falco 3”. “Rock Me Amadeus” was Falco’s only Number One hit in the USA.

I have all sorts of trivia about this song, starting with the fact that it was the first—and so far only—German-language song to reach Number One on the Billboard “Hot 100”. The previous highest-charted German-language song hit Number Two in 1983: “99 Luftballons” by the West German band Nena. It was also the only of his songs to be Number One in both the UK and the USA, which I guess is something.

I have my own personal trivia about the song, which I loved because I loved Falco’s work. I first heard of him when I saw his 1982 debut album, Einzelhaft, in a Chicago record shop that had a lot of the New Wave, dance, and “alternative” music I loved. I bought the album and listened to it often. I was drawn to it because I’d studied German (poorly…) in high school, and was instantly fascinated by the album. The second single was “Der Kommissar”, which I liked. I have to add that I was irritated when British rock band After the Fire released an English-language cover of the song, and, predictably, their version did better on the US pop charts. Ganz natürlich.

So, because of my history, both attempting to learn the language of many of my ancestors, and my earlier discovery of Falco, I loved “Rock Me Amadeus” (and the follow-up single, “Vienna Calling”. I think I bought the album Falco 3, but I'm not sure because if I did, neither it nor Einzelhaft came to New Zealand with me. I know—because I still have it—that I bought a 12-inch version version of "Vienna Calling", which included the American Edit of “Rock Me Amadeus”.

I also liked the video (which, as I’ve made clear by now, isn’t always the case, even when I like the song). I particularly liked the surreality of the visuals, especially the folks in biker gear accompanying Falco dressed as Mozart, and mouthing, “Amadeus, Amadeus!, Amadeus, Amadeus!”

All of which means that this week’s song was unusual among the songs in these series of posts: I liked the song, the artist, and the video. That was rare even then,

“Rock Me Amadeus” reached Number 15 in Australia (Gold), 2 in Canada (Platinum), Number One in New Zealand (Gold), Number One in the UK (Gold), and Number One on the USA’s “Billboard Hot 100”, and was also Number One on the Cash Box “Top 100” chart. The song was certified Platinum in the USA.

The album Falso 3 reached Number 9 in Canada (Platinum), Number 2 in New Zealand, Number 32 in the UK, and Number 3 on the USA’s “Billboard 200” (Gold). The album didn’t chart in Australia.

This series will return in three weeks, on April 19, with the next new Number One from 1986.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1986” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 1 – January 18, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 2 – February 15, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 3 – March 1, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 4 – March 15, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 5 – March 22, 2026

AmeriNZ Podcast episode 423 is now available

AmeriNZ Podcast episode 423, “Nineteen years”, is now available from the podcast website. There, you can listen, download or subscribe to the podcast episode, along with any other episode.

Today is the nineteenth anniversary of the day I uploaded the first episode of the AmeriNZ Podcast. Naturally, I had to do a new episode to celebrate the day—and to update everything that’s happened since my previous episode.

The five most recent episodes of the podcast are listed on the sidebar on the right side of this blog.

A welcome warning

Most people get warnings, alerts, advisories, etc., and often they can be useful, like warnings of approaching storms, for example. Earlier this month I got an alert about something happening early next month that was important to know about—and that alert was something I can’t recall ever having received before.

This story begins with an email. On the evening of March 7, I received an email from my electricity provider that said:

WEL Networks, is planning to turn off the power in you area for routine maintenance work between 09:00 AM Thursday 02 April 2026 and 04:00 PM Thursday 02 April 2026.

A little background: WEL Networks distributes power from the national power grid to consumers throughout the Waikato region, which includes Kirikiriroa-Hamilton. The company is owned by WEL Community Trust, and the Trust, in turn, returns an annual dividend to consumers in the form of a credit on their electricity bill.

What made the email so unusual is that I can’t remember ever getting one like it. In the past, WEL would drop notices in our letterboxes if there was going to be a planned interruption in electricity supply, but I think that was back when most of the area I live in was still under construction. It’s been a very long time since I received a leaflet about interruptions, and that’s probably why they’re quite rare now. If my electricity supplier hadn’t sent that email, I might well have ended up surprised when the power is switched off in April, with no idea why it was off. Because I don’t get power bills by mail anymore, an email was the only way the supplier could warn me.

When I read the email, I hoped that “9am and 4pm” means sometime between those hours, and not the entire 7 hours, but I have no way of knowing. They also advised, “Before the planned outage, please make sure you disconnect all electrical equipment,” which really just means switching them off at the wall (in New Zealand, power points/wall outlets all have individual on/off switches for each outlet). That’s good advice for sensitive things like TVs and computers, and anything that’s always on, like fridges. When the power has gone out unexpectedly, usually because of storms, I always switch those items off at the wall to protect them when the power comes back on.

Another part of the email was for households where someone “depends on electricity for critical medical support”, as the email put it, and such folks were advised that they can contact their electricity company to see what their options are. I'd have thought that people with critical medical equipment would already have a contingency plan (I certainly would), but power companies are required to help those who don’t.

Hamilton City Council doesn’t send any kind of notices of work being done in the area, like tree trimming, weed spraying on Council land, or, even worse, when the water is going to be shut off for any scheduled reason. HCC hardly ever even posts alerts on their Facebook page, so pretty much everything they do is a surprise, which isn’t ideal.

I was glad that I was sent that email, and it’s even better that we got nearly a month’s advance warning of a power outage (when I say “we”, that’s mostly because I posted about this on our community Facebook Page, partly because I have no idea whether other electricity companies sent notices to their customers, nor whether others read such emails). I added the event to my calendar, of course, so I can remember it’s happening, because I’d certainly be unlikely to remember otherwise. This way, when it happens, I can be prepared—devices fully charged, coffee made before 9am, those sorts of things, because my solar panels don't have battery backup.

So, thanks to that unusual email, I should be set. I guess knowledge really is power.

Update – April 2, 2026: This post has been updated.

A cleaning work-around

Most people have tips and tricks they use for household chores, especially cleaning. Some people share those on social media, and it turns out that many of those shared things actually work—and others definitely do not. This isn't about an actual tip or tick, but an adaptation I’ve made to make one particular cleaning task easier—even if it might not sound like it does.

As I’ve said before, Leo tracks in grass clippings every time he comes back inside—and so do I, for that matter, but he goes outside several times a day and I don’t. When I mow the lawn, it only takes a couple days before the carpet in the living area is covered with various sizes of clippings, including longer weed clippings that the line trummer lopped off (I leave them where they fall in the hope they might help kill off the weeds; I’ll clean it all up this winter when they hardly grow).

The problem is that those clippings, especially the long ones, fill up the vacuum quickly, or even cause a clog. When I realised all that a few years ago, I’d walk around and pick-up the long pieces—which hurt my back, of course.

Back at our previous house, I bought one of those “grabber” things, with pincers at the end operated by a squeeze handle, and that because of baby Leo: He had a habit of taking his toys under our super-king bed, and leave them in the middle where I couldn’t reach them, and there wasn’t enough room for me to crawl under the bed. I could grab his toy with the grabber, and then hand the toy to a very happy Leo—who would carry it back under the bed sooner or later (he eventually stopped doing that, but if he does it now, he still forgets he did that…).

The grabber has been handy for me whenever I drop something that falls into a difficult-to-get-to place, so it was logical for me to use it to pick up the big bits of grass and weeds—and bits of stuffing that Leo pulls out of his toys. The photo above shows the results of my recent hunting expedition, posed on a source of (most of) the troublesome debris.

When I’m done hunting, I vacuum as normal, and it always goes better and faster than it would if I didn’t do the hunting. Different vacuums might work differently, but the one I use (which I bought around six months ago) is awesome, and my pre-vacuuming chore means I don’t need to empty the dust bin as often.

If this wasn’t weird enough for some people, there’s this: Picking up the larger debris manually is oddly satisfying. It’s quiet (no vacuum is…), and I’m never tempted to move fast as I am when I vacuum. It’s quieter, slower, even more leisurely, than any other cleaning chore that I do, and it’s kind of nice to have that sometimes. Still, even I don’t do it every week, but when I do I never regret it.

To each their own!

A well-meaning fail

Not every project I take on works out, but all of them begin with good intentions. Recently I tried a project with the best of intentions, but it didn’t pan out. Even so, I don’t regret a thing.

The background is simple: Leo will turn nine in a few months, and I’ve noticed that as he’s grown older, he’s had more trouble jumping onto furniture, like our bed. To be honest, I think some of it is performative, because if I walk over to lift him up, he suddenly manages to jump up on the bed, or whatever. Even so, he’s a little guy about to turn nine, and, just like me, he’ll need some minor alterations to things to make his ageing easier.

I thought that there was something I could do to help him, and I designed something a kind of steps to but at the foot of the bed. I imagined a three-tier thing with storage in each tier. It’d be strong enough for me to sit on, like wooden the blanket box that’s there right now. However, the Garage of No Return doesn’t have enough room for me to build anything, and I don’t know when that will change.

It was then that I found a four-tier step system (the bottom of the two photos at left; the blanket box I was using before is the top half) that I thought would work. It’s a bit smaller than what I designed, but I thought that the four steps would make it easier for Leo. Each “step” is actually a soft-sided storage box, and each step is attached to the next-smaller step using a zip (aka zipper) on the front and back. The zips were a little tricky to fasten, but assembly was otherwise straightforward

And that was the end of the success. Leo wouldn’t step on any step, and wouldn’t jump onto a high one like he did on the old blanket box (below, right). I tried to lead him up the steps, but his reaction was as if he thought I was trying to hurt him. He didn’t “get” how to walk up stairs. He’s a smart little guy, so this puzzled me—after all, we had stair in the last house we all had together.

Yeah, well, I often forget how much time has passed since then. He lived in that house for 19 months (beginning shortly before his first birthday, and we moved away when he was 19 months old). I can’t remember how often he went up and down stairs at the old house, but we left that house more than six years ago, and we’ve lived in this one-storey house ever since.

I know that it may have nothing to do with his past, but that the small stairs I bought for him may not have felt safe to him. So, I put the old blanket box back with just a blanket on top of it (making the top he jumps onto a centimetre or so lower than it had been).I moved the fancy steps over to the other side of the bed and put some of his toys on higher steps: He’s never tried to get them, not even when I put his favourite toy on it. I think that if the steps were more conventional, he might’ve been more willing to use it—or, at least, not as frightened of it as he seemed to be, but it it what it is.

This means I’m probably back to building something for him. Right now I think it should have a wide lower step for him to step onto, but I’ll have to create a temporary one to see if he uses it. We’ll see. The point is, just as I have various plans to make this house better for ageing me, I’ll make changes to make things easier for an ageing Leo, too. This particular attempt just wasn’t a good one. Oh, well—onward.

Seasonal changes

By anyone’s reckoning, New Zealand is now definitely in Autumn. The 2026 March Equinox arrived March 21 at 3:46am. Leo and I were asleep at the time, of course, and its arrival certainly didn’t wake us up, and yes, I’m being a bit sarcastic. As I’ve made clear, in this part of the world we use the first of the relevant month as the start of the seasons, and not the equinoxes and solstices later that month.

I’ve also pointed out how the weather changes when it changes, and it has little to do with whichever date one chooses for the start of seasons. This particular autumn has certainly followed that pattern: We’ve had quite summery weather this month, and a few days ago Kirikiriroa-Hamilton hit a very summery high of 27 degrees (80.6F). It’s also been rather dry, as summer is, and not rainy as part later in Autumn can be.

However, there are obvious changes. The photo up top, which I took this afternoon, shows the tree on my street that s been in many of my photos over the years. That tree has an increasing number of yellow leaves, which means we’re not far from seeing the leaves leave. I’m not happy about that—just like every other year, of course.

Still, this particular season isn’t all bad. The cooler weather means the grass—and the weeds—don’t grow as quickly. This makes autumn (and early spring) the best times to clear out weeds, as I still need to do. It also means that the garage won’t be as hot as it is in summer, and that means I can work in there. Meanwhile, the rest of the house doesn’t need cooling quite as much, and doesn’t yet need heating, so I don’t sweat as much doing projects in the house—and it’s getting close to the all-too-brief time when I can open the windows—using my new window screens!

My list of projects to do (or just complete) is still very long—probably inhumanly so. The seasonal weather change may make projects physically easier to do, but it certainly doesn’t guarantee I’ll make any progress on any of them, let alone finish any. And yet: Every day is another opportunity to succeed, and it that doesn’t happen that day, then maybe the next one.

Honestly, though, I really do prefer that tree with it’s summer outfit on.

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 5

Another week, and it’s another one-week Number One. Wait, another one-week Number One, the week after a different one-week hit? What is this, 1985? Just kidding—I’m actually glad the pace of the 1986 hits has been slower.

Be that as it may, on March 22, 1986 the new Number One song was “These Dreams” (video up top) by the American rock band Heart. The song was the third single from the group’s eighth studio album, “Heart”. “These Dreams” was also the band’s first Number One hit.

There’s an unusual bit of trivia about this song: This week’s song was wittern by Bernie Taupin and Martin Page, who also wrote the song in Part 23 of the 1985 series, “We Built This City” by Starship. They’re certainly very different songs.

Heart is group I really liked, and I liked this particular song, though it wasn't my favourite Heart song. I first became aware of the group because of a lot of TV commercials promoting their debut album, Dreamboat Annie. However, my connection with the band really started when their "Dog & Butterfly" tour (promoting the album of the same name) appeared at my university. There’s a little story about that.

My university’s arena, used mostly for basketball (go the Dawgs!—actually, I went to one game there), had a lot of concerts, too. However, in 1977, many weren’t exactly huge stars, but then they suddenly started programming bigger acts. In my first year at university, they hosted Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen, neither of whom I was interested in (though, decades later, I wished I’d seen Springsteen…). The first group I saw was Bad Company, who were promoting their new album, Desolation Angels (which I bought, but no longer have). I went because they were the first group that I was kinda, sorta, familiar with. But when Heart was there, I was really excited to see them. They performed songs from their first four albums.

Back to 1986, I have to admit that the video for “These Dreams” didn’t grab me (apparently a common thing for me in 1986… or, always?). I mean, it was okay, I guess, but it wasn’t one I was excited to see replayed. I was similarly indifferent to this song, and to me it was a pleasant background song with lead vocals by a singer I enjoyed. But—and even I’m surprised I thought this way—where were the rocking vocals I’d come to know Ann Wilson for doing? However, I think that in those days I probably would’ve listened to her sing the phone book (not a literal fact). Let’s just say my tastes are, and always have been, varied, shall we? Yes, let’s. The larger point here is that I really liked heart, and I thought this song was okay. That’s very often good enough for me, and while I remember very little of it (it was a long time agao…), I know I enjoyed it.

“These Dreams” reached Number 27 in Australia, 6 in Canada, 62 in the UK, and Number One on the USA’s “Billboard Hot 100” and “Adult Contemporary” charts, and it reached Number 2 on their “Mainstream Rock” chart. It was also Number One on the Cash Box “Top 100” chart. The song apparently didn’t chart in New Zealand, but it was nevertheless certified Gold, and the linked Wikipedia article doesn’t provide any sales certification information for any other country. No idea what that means.

The album Heart reached Number 37 in Australia, Number 3 in Canada (6x Platinum), Number 19 in the UK (Gold), and Number 1 on the USA’s “Billboard 200” (5x Platinum). The album was certified Platinum in the USA. The album didn’t chart in New Zealand.

This series will return next week, on March 29, with the next new Number One from 1986, and it's NOT another one-week hit! But it IS one I liked a lot.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1986” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 1 – January 18, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 2 – February 15, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 3 – March 1, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 4 – March 15, 2026

Fueling the rising costs for everyone

Fuel prices are rising throughout the world due to Tr*mp’s war against Iran, and obviously New Zealand’s fuel prices are rising fast, too. A couple days ago, an economist predicted that petrol prices could pass $4 per litre (roughly US$8.81 per US gallon). I think our prices will probably reach that point in maybe a week.

Here's why I say that: Late yesterday afternoon, I used the Gaspy App to look at prices at around 50 petrol stations within a relatively short drive from my house. The cheapest price for 91 was $2.93 per litre (three stations), and the highest price was $3.26 per litre. This evening, the cheapest price was $3.14 per litre (one station), and the highest price was $3.40—that’s around 24 hours later. It will keep rising.

Despite being late to take the situation seriously, the current NZ government is starting to talk about “worst case scenario” solutions. They claim NZ has seven weeks of fuel supply, counting both what’s here and what’s on the way, but experts in the industry estimate it’s actually around five weeks. One specific—and big—problem is that around 47% of NZ’s refined fuel comes from Korea, and they’ve talked about suspending exports, and if they do, this situation could get serious fast.

The government’s first step will be to work with partner countries overseas to try to find alternative sources of fuel, and they’re talking about temporarily relaxing fuel standards (I think, but don’t know, that they mean things like allowing higher levels of Sulfur in diesel). They also are working on a series of escalating restrictions on sales (to prioritise essential users, like emergency services and truckers shipping food to supermarkets) that they could use, if that becomes necessary—along with security guards at petrol stations.

I’m extremely lucky in that I don’t need to drive much or far, so this shouldn’t affect me for a while. Sales restrictions, if they happen, would obviously affect me, too, but, like everyone else, rising prices will increasingly mean I won’t drive anywhere unless I have to.

However, we'll all share the pain of fast-rising fuel prices because EVERYTHING we need to buy will become more expensive, including groceries, which are already at too-high prices—and, of course, farmers need fuel to grow and harvest our food (plus fertiliser may be hard to obtain). We’ve also been warned that because of all the uncertainties, there could be fuel surcharges added to anything delivered directly to us. Could? Make that there will be.

Related to that, I realised recently that this situation could mean that the guy who mows my front lawn may raise his prices. However, he recently cut back to mowing every other week, so even if he raises his prices, I should still be paying less per month than when he was mowing weekly. Like I said, I’m lucky.

No one knows how this will play out, or when the war will end. It certainly doesn’t help that the USA has a government that doesn’t have a clue what it’s doing, and the Republican politicians clearly have no idea whatsoever how to bring their war to an end. So, things right now are serious and getting worse, but they're not yet dire—emphasis on yet.

New Zealand is as vulnerable as any other country, and our own “Coalition of Chaos” government hasn’t exactly been inspiring confidence that they know what to do. Even so, I’m not willing to jump on the panic wagon about all this. First, there’s absolutely nothing I can do about the cause of all this turmoil. All I can do is manage what’s within my control, and I’m definitely doing that.

But, seriously, isn’t it about time we finally got to have some precedented times?!!!

Huge improvement

I’ve been very busy lately. With all sorts of things going on, plus a few not going on (rest days, in other words). In general, though, I’ve been busy enough that I haven’t had time for lots of things, including, obviously, this blog. Among the things I’ve been doing are some that I would’ve talked about here, and so, I decided, I will. Today I’m starting with what I think is an enormous positive change.

Every year, I have to get a WOF (Warrant of Fitness for my car. A WOF is basically a safety check—brakes, indicators, headlights/tail lights, no rust, tyre condition, etc. Every year I’ve hated doing it because the whole process can easily take at least an hour and a half—last year, it took an hour and forty minutes, which at the time I thought was pretty “fast” for them.

As I mentioned in last year’s post, VTNZ (where I get my WOF) started offering online booking, this year I decided to try to book an appointment—for the next day. I wasn’t exepecting much—I was trying for the very next day, after all, but I had to go that day regardless because my WOF expired that day. I was surprsided (maybe even a bit shocked) that I got an appointment for 11:40am that day, a perfect time for me (I avoid appointments for anything before then, if I can).

I got there at 11:35 (delayed by traffic slowing down for a sudden downpour), put my car in the appointments queue, and then went inside to pay. There it went south quickly (I still say their computer OS must be CP/M…). One clerk was really fast, the other not as much, but both were bogged down by customers renewing their driver licences.

After waiting in the queue for around 20 minutes, a clerk asked if anyone was there for a booked appointment and then said my plate number. Fortunately, I was next in line, anyway, because folks would’ve been annoyed if I was called before them.

By this time, the guy was nearly done checking my car, and I was gone a few minutes later—less than half an hour after I arrived. HUGE improvement! I took the photo up top standing just in front of my car (not in the photo, obviously) looking over to the pedestrian entry and the two lanes used for non-appointment WOF checks. At the time I was waiting for the guy to finalise the WOF by putting the official sticker on the inside of my windscreen.

After that exctiement, my next stop was to pick up a few things at the supermarket I moaned about early last month, and even that stop was much better than last time I went there. All in all a pretty good day.

This particular story is about how something I’ve dreaded doing for years was suddenly massively better. That doesn’t mean I’ll actually “like” taking care of that particular chore, of course, but the fact that I’ll no longer need to waste so much time doing it is huge. Sometimes, it really is the small things that make the most difference, and this improvement was huge.

Because I’m a giver, here are previous posts where I talked about getting a WOF, at least in part:

My car is fit – 2025
It was about change, not coincidence – 2024
The other real life – 2023
Sunday chores – 2016
Discovery in ordinary life – 2017
It is fit – 2013
Just a day – 2011
Testing day – 2009

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 4

Mid-March and this is the first one-week Number One song of 1986. There were more.

On March 15, 1986 the new Number One song was “Sara” (video up top) by the American rock band Starship hit Number One for one week. The song was the second single from Starship, after 1985’s "We Built This City", which I talked about in my ”Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 23” post. The song was also the second and final Number One single from their debut album, “Knee Deep in the Hoopla” (“ We Built This City” was the first single). There would be one more for the band, though.

So: While—obviously—many people loved Starship, others, um, did not. I was mostly on the fence about the group, but, to be completely honest, I actually stopped paying attention when Grace Slick left the group. Be that as it may, I thought this song was pleasant enough, though it didn’t exactly grab me, either—but, then, many (most?) pop songs don’t “grab” me, so that’s not unusual. I guess you could say of my “relationship” with Starship, “It’s complicated.”

The video for the song also didn’t grab me—and that, too, isn’t unusual, of course. I’ve always considered music videos to be their own art form, and when they’re good, they’re pretty awesome. Most music videos are not pretty awesome (obviously?), but the ones that are get repeat views from me. This video, however, was not one of those. Oh, well.

“Sara” reached Number 10 in Australia, Number One in Canada, 16 in New Zealand, 66 in the UK, and Number One on the USA’s “Billboard Hot 100”, as well as on their “Adult Contemporary” chart, and it reached 12 on their “Mainstream Rock” chart. The linked Wikipedia article doesn’t provide any sales certification information.

The album Knee Deep in the Hoopla reached Number 34 in Australia, Number 16 in Canada (Platinum), Number 43 in New Zealand, and Number 7 on the USA’s “Billboard 200”. The album was certified Platinum in the USA. (There’s no chart information for the UK, which usually means it didn’t reach the bottom rung).

This series will return next week, on March 22, with the next new Number One from 1986, and it's another one-week hit.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1986” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 1 – January 18, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 2 – February 15, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 3 – March 1, 2026

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 3

It’s been a slow and relaxed start to this year’s series, hasn’t it? Here we are in March and this is only the third Number One of the year. Last year seemed so frantic by comparison, what with ALL those one-week hits. At any rate, there was a new Number One song this week in 1986, and it’s one I thought—well, let’s leave that for a moment, shall we? On March 1, 1986, “Kyrie” (video up top) by American pop rock band Mr. Mister hit Number One for two weeks. The song was the second and last Number One from Mr. Mister, after 2025’s "Broken Wings", which I talked about in my ”Weekend Diversion: 1985, Part 25” post. “Kyrie” was also the second single from their second studio album, “Welcome to the Real World” (“Broken Wings was the first single).

As with most Number Ones, this song was definitely on the radio a lot at the time, but that didn’t help for me: I absolutely loathed this song. I liked the sound well enough, and yet… Okay, here’s the thing: As the son and grandson of Lutheran preachers, I was well aware of what “kyrie” means in Christian use: Kýrie, eléison; Christé, eléison; Kýrie, eléison. which roughly translates as "Lord, have mercy; Christ, have mercy; Lord, have mercy." In Lutheran liturgy, the Kyrie was a particular part of Sunday services. At the time this song was popular, I still considered myself a Lutheran, though I’d probably already left the church mentally, BUT I was definitely already a committed secularist, and, at the very best, very most charitable, I felt this song was inappropriately proselytising, and I didn’t like that—at all. For historic context, this was the same era in which self-proclaimed “christians” were by far the most strident (and wealthiest) opponents the LGBT+ communities faced (not unlike these days…).

I was surprised when I researched this post and learned in the Wikipedia article linked above that “According to [co-composer and lead vocalist Richard] Page's statements, he was initially skeptical about singing the Christian text Lang had written because he didn't want to make a ‘religious statement’”. So, even he realised it was religious. What I also learned, though, is something I was oblivious to:

There is a myth that singer Richard Page wrote "Kyrie" while lying in a hospital bed after being assaulted. It was John Lang who had been assaulted three years before the composition; Lang has stated that the incident has nothing to do with the song.

Well, okay then. I guess. Personally, I don’t think that any of that cleared up the religiosity (or lack of) in the song, and that was always the sticking point I just couldn’t get past, even though I liked the sound of the song well enough. Once again, this is an example of something that wasn’t the first or last time such a thing would happen.

“Kyrie” reached Number 11 in Australia, Number One in Canada, 30 in New Zealand, 11 in the UK, and Number One on the USA’s “Billboard Hot 100”, as well as their “Mainstream Rock” chart. The song was also Number One on the Cashbox “Top 100 Singles” chart. The linked Wikipedia article doesn’t provide any certification information. Also, I see that it charted worst in Australia and New Zealand, arguably the least religious countries I write about—though I stress that may or may not be relevant.

The Welcome to the Real World album reached Number 17 in Australia, Number 2 in Canada (3x Platinum), Number 21 in New Zealand, Number 6 in the UK (Gold), and Number 1 on the USA’s “Billboard 200” chart. The album was certified Platinum in the USA.

This series will return in two weeks, on March 15, with the next new Number One from 1986, and it's also the first one-week hit of the year.

Previously in the “Weekend Diversion – 1986” series:

Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 1 – January 18, 2026
Weekend Diversion: 1986, Part 2 – February 15, 2026