Canion dot Blog

Day 22 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

I’ve always watching and playing sport. As a kid, I tried most sports that entered my world view. I can remember playing:

• volleyball
• cricket
• basketball
• tennis
• football (Australian Rules)
• soccer
• baseball
• swimming
• athletics (I loved high jump, hated running)

The sports I really enjoyed were cricket and basketball. If I’d had a better experience with cricket, I probably would have stuck at it longer. I loved bowling and would be happy doing it for hours on end.

The sport I excelled at was basketball. I was an athletic white guy. I am 6'3" and was able to throw down some good dunks. Although my mates were always frustrated that I seemed happier firing from beyond the three-point line! I maintain I was ahead of my time - look at how the game is played now.

Unfortunately basketball has taken its toll on my body. I’ve got an ankle that won’t bend properly, hips that are creaking, and knees that have lost their cartilage so they crack and pop as I climb stairs, misaligned fingers and a thumb that strains with the slightest effort.

Despite all those injuries and the awareness that things are going to get worse, I wouldn’t change anything. I loved playing basketball so much. For me it went beyond a sport; it was a lifestyle. I made so many friends; I have amazing memories of playing with some incredible players and I’ve met some impressive people.

The two most famous basketball people I’ve met are probably Luc Longley and Phil Jackson. Ironically, neither of these encounters came because I was a basketball player. Rather, they came about because my father-in-law was Australia’s Ambassador to the United States of America and both me and those basketball celebrities were at a gala “G’Day USA” event.

Now I’m transitioning to the next phase of my sporting life. I am watching my eldest boy try a variety of sports. To date, it seems he is enjoying cricket the most. I wonder what my younger kid will get interested in?

Day 21 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

adjective
(of a feeling, especially love) not returned: he’s been pining with unrequited love.

Who set these prompts anyway? That guy should be put to the sword for this one. I can’t think of anything to write about ‘unrequited’.

A couple of days ago I wrote some thoughts on love. So this post could be those thoughts, unreturned?

In searching for some inspiration about what to write about, I did discover that ‘Unrequited’ was the title of an episode of The X-Files. It was also the title of a low-budget movie that doesn’t look very good.

Sorry, that’s all I’ve got.

Day 20 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

You gotta fight
for your right
to party!

My thanks to The Beastie Boys for their guest introduction.

I’m not a fighter; never have been. I recall Jason Bulpitt (may he Rest In Peace) squaring up to me in the school playground one day. I countered by being a smart-arse, running my mouth. Intelligent diatribe was my competitive advantage - not fist fights.

This approach to fighting has probably led to my engagement in politics over the years. A focus on the verbal stoush ahead of the physical kind. The kind of fight I might have a chance of winning. Plus, winning can benefit a lot of people.

Political fights can be hard and deflating. They can also be exhilarating and rewarding. That’s why we keep coming back for more. It’s good to fight for a better country.

Day 19 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

Love is a super-complicated topic. I know I love my wife, I love my kids. But truth be told, I don’t know how I know that I love them.

I know that I love, in a technical sense. Yet I only feel it rarely. To be fair, I do occasionally experience an overwhelming sense of affection that pulls at my insides. This is probably the truest expression of love. But I don’t get that often. Is that a standard, everyday feeling for others? Am I missing what other people experience?

I wonder if others have a clearer understanding of what love is, or how it feels. Perhaps I’m missing out on the feeling of emotional love. It’s like my rational side gets in the way of my emotional side.

Heavy stuff. A bit too daunting to think more deeply about at this point.

Day 18 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

I’m not a gamer; this month I unsubscribed from Apple Arcade because I wasn’t playing any of the games on offer despite a number of them being good. It’s an opportunity cost issue. There are only so many hours in a day and I find enjoyment doing other things ahead of gaming… most of the time.

I say that because rarely I do become obsessed with a game. My most recent example is Zelda: Breath of the Wild. With that game, I would sneak away with my son’s Switch and play it for hours. At first I was making my way through the game naturally. Then as I progressed, I got more serious and downloaded an iOS app to help me track the locations I had been, and which areas I still needed to unlock.

I continued to upgrade my character, beyond that which was necessary to claim victory over the big boss. I didn’t know that at the time of course, but given how relatively easy the final boss battle was, I’d say that I had swung the scales significantly in my favour.

Zelda was an epic game. It captured my mind for months. It was an expensive game but on an entertainment per hour basis, was incredibly cheap. I don’t know when I will encounter another game that captivates me in that that way but I’m sure it will happen, I’ll become a gamer for a month or two, then go back to normal non-gamer life.

Day 17 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

I’m not one for parties; my introversion means I’m diametrically opposed to them.

Having said that, I’m actually attending a party this afternoon/evening. It is a 60th birthday celebration though and should be a nice one. It is incorporating a showing of Blade Runner. I haven’t seen that movie in about 20 years, so I’m interested to see my interpretation of it now.

Another party issue arising is planning to host a 4th birthday party for our youngest son. Trying to decide what to do for that is a puzzler as well. Do we host it at home, or out somewhere? Who to invite? We don’t have friends who have kids of a similar age, but it won’t be much of a party if he doesn’t have some similar-aged kids around. We need to get moving on the planning so we can get the invites out, but we’re having trouble generating motivation. That’s not good parenting, is it!

Day 16 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

Our family might be about to lose our second animal of the year to old age. Our Standard Poodle, Jeff, is not holding up so well. He has developed large cysts under his skin, his teeth are wearing out and now he seems to have hurt his paw.

Earlier this year we had to say goodbye to our Airedale Terrier, Indi. Her absence seems to have accelerated the decline of Jeff. He relied on her so much to be top dog and I don’t think he has been the same since she has been gone.

I recall a couple of months ago when we were at the dog beach with Jeff, and we saw another Airedale Terrier. Jeff went running up to it, and you could just tell from his body language that he thought it was Indi. A sniff and a closer look confirmed that it was a stranger. If a dog can look deflated, Jeff did in that moment.

We bring animals into our lives knowing that it’s not forever and that one day we will need to make hard decisions about their future. The knowledge of that, however, doesn’t make the reality of the situation any easier.

Day 15 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

About three years ago we did a house renovation. We had our kitchen gutted and rebuilt, our bathrooms reconfigured, wood floors sanded and interior walls painted, and a new front deck.

A huge job already was made bigger because we had to move all of our furniture into storage and move our family into a short-term rental for the duration of the project. It reminded me why I don’t like moving house. Packing is the worst!

The renovation grew our mortgage significantly but improved our quality of life. We spend so much time in our home that making it a comfortable environment was worth the investment.

We had an excellent builder on the project. I’m no handyman so it was absolutely necessary to employ a professional to do the job right. That’s an element of our renovation for which I hold no regrets. It’s also a standing principle of mine: if you’re not good at something and have no interest in learning the skill, pay somebody to deliver. Money is a resource that can be deployed strategically to save your own frustration and heartache. When it comes to a renovation, if I were doing it myself there would be plenty of both. I’d rather be without the money!

Day 14 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

Recycling is kind of a big deal in our house. Our council runs a three bin system for rubbish management: one bin for food and organics, one for rubbish, and a third for recyclables.

My wife Hannah works in the recycling industry. She is the Head of External Relations at Western Australia Return Recycle Renew (WARRRL). This organisation has responsibility for establishing a new container deposit scheme for our State. That will mean that for every drink container brought back to a recycling point, 10 cents is given to the recycler.

As well as reducing the amount of waste going to landfill, or the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, the scheme provides an opportunity for community engagement. I could choose to have my recycled containers benefit an organisation that elects to participate. For instance, if my son’s local Scout group gets involved they can use it as a fund-raising measure.

Western Australia is a geographically huge State and this is rolling out across it all. Hannah and the entire WARRRL team have been working hard to get this initiative up and running and I am proud of the work they are doing. It will be exciting when the system is ready to launch!

Day 13 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

My favourite beverage is coffee. There is no contest. There is not much better than an Australian flat white.

Italian coffee is great but it’s a transitory drink. You get it at the bar, drink it and leave. Don’t sit down because it will cost you a fortune.

American coffee is bad. It’s either sweetened and flavoured to the point where its more milkshake than coffee, or its drip-filtered and been sitting in storage for a while.

Australian coffee has the quality of the Italian style, but there is a social norm of sitting down at the coffee shop to drink it. Our baristas are great at frothing the milk to achieve micro-foam rather than aerated fluff, and we benefit from a delicious crema when they pour.

Regarding other beverages, I enjoy sharing a pot of tea at home with my wife. She is addicted to tea and doesn’t drink coffee at all. I think that’s weird, but there you go. I rarely drink soft drink. Perhaps an occasional Coke Zero. Never in my life have I had a Red Bull or other super-caffeinated beverage. I can’t see how they can possibly be good for me.

Day 12 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

A smell can be a most evocative sense. It can stimulate memory, facilitate calm or revulsion, or provide us with timely information.

If I smell new carpet, I am transported back to my Year 1 classroom which had been renovated and new carpet laid. That’s an associated formed around 35 years ago. The smell of a basketball stadium: that combination of sweat, dencorub, and timber treatment to this day hastens my heart beat.

Today I was between meetings so I had the opportunity to park near the beach for a few minutes. As I opened the car window, my olfactory senses were treated to that wonderful scent of salt air traveling on a warm breeze. That is much nicer smell than that of a dirty nappy, which over the past 8 years I’ve become far to familiar with.

A smell I miss is the cooking of roast beef and yorkshire pudding. That was a staple of my childhood diet but I don’t have the time or inclination to make it myself these days.

Of all our senses, I think smell is the most associative. I don’t think vision, hearing, touch or taste can transport us back in time or recall memories of a person or place the way a smell can. We should probably take more time out to appreciate our noses.

Day 11 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

I miss my childhood. It was such a different era; it’s hard to recognise my childhood as an experience compared with those of my kids.

The memories of my childhood seem like something that should be written off as me looking back through rose-coloured glasses. But I contest that not everything was great and nice, but it really was what retro throwbacks show the 1980s to be.

Some of my key memories across a relatively wide age range include:

• Leaving the house to ride my bike around the streets without saying where I was going. I didn’t know where I was going - how could I tell others?
• Staying out until dusk then going home to either my own home, or my friend’s house for dinner. I think I almost split my time 50:50.
• Riding our BMX bikes through citrus orchards where dirt bike jumps had been constructed, and getting mega air.
• Playing pick-up basketball all day, and sweating litres.
• Playing multi-day games of Monopoly. Leaving it set up to pick up the next day.
• Climbing trees - but never as well as my friend.
• Spending hours throwing a ball against a wall, then playing a solid cricket stroke when it bounced back to me.
• Backyard camping for days (maybe even weeks?) on end. We had a big block, so we could pitch the tent in the back yard and be invisible from the house.
• Playing a season of Under 13’s cricket and being completely isolated by the other boys - and the coach. (Things are much better in this regard now, it seems.)
• Abseiling, rock climbing and other cool activities at school that probably wouldn’t be allowed anymore.

I’m proud of my childhood. I had enough freedom to be adventurous and I managed to avoid any major dangers. I learnt to know my limits and stay within them. I had a sense of place in my suburb.

If I had a time machine, I would happily go back to the early 1980s and do it all again.

Day 10 of Blogvember. A full list of prompts for the month is available.

I’ve made a concerted effort this year to increase my volume of book reading.

In recent years my reading has been dominated by web pages, articles and RSS feeds. This resulted in a decline in my book reading - something I used to do a lot of.

To track my reading and add some motivation I set a target on Goodreads.. This has worked because I’ve read 23 books against my target of 20 - a target I revised upwards mid-year.

Another thing that has helped has been an Audible subscription. I think it’s fair enough to consider listening to audiobooks as reading. I’m still consuming the story; it actually takes longer than reading the printed version, and it allows me to read in ‘gaps’ of time, notably driving.

I’ve enjoyed my return to reading. Once more I feel like my mind is being stretched and my imagination activated.