Category: Blog

The Little Things

On By MikeIn Blog, PeopleLeave a comment

It was just a small gesture or as they say, it’s the little things.

We were just warming up with hot cups of coffee, tea and hot chocolate after braving the first chilly, windy, morning of Auskick* this season. Appropriately as it was Mothers Day our daughter was treating my wife, our granddaughter the Auskicker, and myself to some warm drinks. We were just starting to thaw out a little when I noticed the young mother at the next table who was sitting alone while her partner was queuing to place their order. The mother was cradling in her left arm a baby, a newly arrived in this world baby judging by the size alone. Continue reading “The Little Things” →

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New age old age

On By MikeIn Blog, People, TechnologyLeave a comment

My dear old Granpop often said “Ahhh getting old’s a bugger” and I can hear him saying it still after all these years. Please pardon the vulgarity but that is exactly what he said and to replace “bugger” with something more acceptable would be to lose the strength of feeling in his voice at the time. Of course what he meant by the expression was that getting old wasn’t something he was enjoying at all. As this baby boomer, a so-called New Age man, heads into Old Age I am starting to appreciate the depth of feeling and the essential truth in his words. Continue reading “New age old age” →

My 5 Morning Rituals

On By MikeIn Blog, Inspiration, WritingLeave a comment

I was recently invited to subscribe to a newsletter by a guy called Tim Ferriss through a marketing ploy of his. As part of the enticement, he was offering a set of 3 free pdf’s, the first of which was “5 Morning Rituals” and it really struck a chord with me. I have been annoyed lately with how my mornings, and subsequently, my days seem to just drift away with little to show for it at the end of the day. So because of this, I decided to subscribe just to get the pdf’s. His morning rituals article appealed to me, if not in entirety, at least for the structure and the rationale of it and I felt I could change it around to suit me a little better. I hasten to point out that these are not chores but rather a daily process you do for your own benefit and enjoyment. Yes I love doing each of these little rituals, these are the ultimate “me” time.

So here is what I have started on and have been using for a little while now and I am feeling so much more focused and “getting stuff done” better. Continue reading “My 5 Morning Rituals” →

Got Qi?

Got Qi?

On By MikeIn Blog, Latest, NatureLeave a comment

After my shower this morning, quite at random, I put on a t-shirt that I had got from a lady on the qigong course I attended in Texas back in 2008. It has on the front:

got Qi?

and on the back:

Qi (chee), n. Matter on the verge of becoming energy; energy at the point of materialising. The essential energy of the universe which maintains the vital activities of life.

The only reason I put it on was that it was the first one I put my hand on in the drawer, no special reason. But that was about to change. Continue reading “Got Qi?” →

The Sentence

The Sentence

On By MikeIn Blog, Latest, People, WritingLeave a comment

The gift of life comes with its inevitable companion, the sentence of death. You can’t have one without the other, there is no choice. You live, you die. As soon as you start living the clock starts ticking. Every life, human, animal, plant, no exceptions. There is no control other than adding the full stop through suicide, self-destruction. The length of the sentence is arbitrary and therefore unknown, unlike the sentence pronounced by a human court sitting in judgement. The sentence though is full of commas and colons and semicolons and capitals and hyphens, all defining the events of our life. But where does the natural judgement on the length of the sentence come from? Continue reading “The Sentence” →

441 days for Daisy

441 Days

On By MikeIn Blog, Latest, Pets1 Comment

441 days. A death sentence, the date set. With the date of pronouncement being the 5th of September 2017, add 441 days and you get 20th November 2018. The finality of an actual date struck me hard. Our vet has confirmed that our little Daisy has a heart murmur and it is more pronounced than it was on the earlier visit about a month ago. Dr Andrea just comes straight out with “441 days is the average prognosis for this condition”. Life expectancy that is, the average time it takes before the condition takes its victory, death. Death will conquer, overcome, the indomitable spirit of our little Daisy with a certain finality. An eventuality we knew would happen at some time, but now that it has a date it is just very hard to accept. Final. Real. No avoiding it. Of course, the 441 days is an average and the good side is that it might take longer than that but the downside is that it could also happen much sooner. Continue reading “441 Days” →