🗓️ Weeknote 2025-W23

2025-06-08 16:35

🏃 Ran 15.6km / 615m profile
🚶 Walked 6.3km / 91m - Doing some river walks to keep me from bunging my knee up again. A couple crispy morning photos below.

🏠 I have a housemate! Finally decided to rent out the spare room. It was crazy how quick I got someone in (1 day). He's a good fit. He had his PS5 out in the loungeroom, which made me feel real old. I haven't actually seen online gaming on a console before. I played a bit of GTA 5. The last GTA I played was the top-down GTA 1 & 2! He's a snowboarder, come for the Winter season, just come from Banff. He's had 8 Winter seasons in a row, meaning he hasn't seen Summer for 4 years! I just realised my last housemate was the exact opposite, following Summer around the world as a paraglider, skydiver and scubadiver instructor. Don't people like seasons?

🩸 Health - Gonna sound like an old man right now. For the past 6 months I've been battling a knee issue. I thought it was just an over-use injury from running, but there are so many inputs and outputs around this knee that I can't just pin it down to that. Yesterday, I visited a physio who made time for me on a weekend for a cashy job. It was such a good experience. She had a very holistic approach. Asked many questions, did a bunch of tests, and we had a fantastic conversation about all the things. Let's break down whats going on with me, and related injuries:

• inflammation around the left knee
• sharp pain on ascents at the front of knee
• general tightness and knee making working and exercise simply uncomfortable
• had a right hip tweak 7 months ago, just prior to the knee, which flattened me, couldn't walk for a day, but recovered quick in about a week.
• elbows feel like tennis-elbow
• thumbs feel like arthritis
• cannot sleep beyond 8 hours, waking with upper back pain (around scoliosis) and restricting of breathing. Beds other than mine are worse.
• lower back pain (around spondylolysthesis L5 S1) flares up if I don't stretch every morning.
• get dizzy regularly
• we discussed my change of job 6 months ago as well, which resulted in a change of diet (notably sandwiches instead of leftovers for lunch, and toast for breakfast (bread bread bread)). Job is also a lot more physical so energy levels have changed.
• I have done the same morning stretches for 20 years - no progression of them other than when I get injured, and once injury goes away, I'm back to the same ones again.

One of the tests showed a near-nil firing of left glutes and hamstring. This was the "aha" moment.

We decided knee is OK - no ligament damage etc., but because of my weak glutes/hamstring (potentially on the decline ever since my hip injury (which was overuse)), every time I load the knee, it takes the grunt, inflames, and I pay the price for days after.

We have decided, for the moment, to introduce some new strengthening exercises, focus on routine, introduce magnesium supplements into my diet and start stretching and movement exercises in the evenings to prepare the body for a better night's sleep.

🏢 Work - I wrote some short posts through the week on some undertakings.

✈️ I've almost landed on a 2 week Vietnam itinerary for August. Well, I'm not really making the itinerary. I'm going to do the 10-day Vietnam Southbound tour with Intrepid Travel. I've decided I don't have it in me to plan it myself. Maybe I'll get inspired for my next trip, but for this one I'll get it done for me. If I haven't booked by next-week's Weeknote, you have permission to kick my butt.

💻🏃📈 I've been thoroughly impressed with Lars-Christian's Workout Log so I reached out and he's kindly given me some pointers to get me started with my own log. I use a Garmin Fenix 6 Sapphire to log my recreational activities, which syncs to Garmin Connect, then Strava. I used to be mad on Strava, but have found the UI getting worse and worse, especially without a paid subscription. Not only that, they're making it more and more into the headlines for privacy concerns. I've used the stravalib python library in the past to do a few fun running data projects (I use it for my elevation profile graphs in my header). Nows the time to pull things into my own hands again. Rather than charging my watch at the wall, I charge it at the laptop. When I plug it in, a script downloads the .fit activity files into a folder, ready for whatever I want. Lars-Christian pointed me towards fitparse which gives me the ability to manipulate the data to prepare for any other python tinkering - databases, maps, graphs, you name it.

It'll be a big ongoing project, but I'm looking forward to scrapping stravalib, Strava and Garmin Connect. I'm not quite ready to leave Strava, as I have made, and continue to make, some real-life social connections there, but I won't be writing anything there or posting photos. I'll be building off my activity posts, but also look at doing a bunch of stats too.

💻 Tools

• fitparse - parse .fit files into something useful.

• surfshark - the VPN service I use. Does what I need. Never had any issues.

• spike.news - aggregator of news. Neat design. Uses supabase as the backend.

📺 Watched

• Watching the Super Rugby finals on Dad's Stan subscription. Thanks Dad. I'm not mad on watching sport, but the intensity of Rugby finals ramps up and I find it highly entertaining. Caught Chiefs vs Blues, and Brumbies vs Hurricanes. Both down to the wire.

• Finished Mobland Series 1 - Was pretty good, but my interest waned towards the end. Became a bit repetitive, and lack of action or confrontation against obvious thorny characters bugged me.

• Watching Mr Robot Series 3 - This show just gets me in all the right spots. There's some legit terminal action going on in here.

🎧 Listening to...

• Anthrax - Sound of White Noise (1993) - I was listening to a linux podcast of all places that played the "This is a journey into sound..." snippet from 1958, which is also how this album starts (and appears elsewhere). I immediately loaded Sound of White Noise into my Jellyfin/Finamp playlist. I really dig John Bush's vocals and this metal/rock crossover sound.

🕸️ Currently reading across the web

• May 2025 IndieWeb Carnival Roundup - Great reads on small web communities. I started drafting a submission, but deleted it because I couldn't get the words out. The community I wanted to write about is exactly that - the fringe dwellers, the community hoppers, the ones with social anxiety, imposter syndrome, and all that darkness. I feel like I'm part of that community. We lift each other up in subtle ways. Maybe we don't even know it. If anyone has ever sent me an email, know that you are part of my community and make me feel welcome.

• ELPiS Zine Issue 9 - I really dig the retro small-web content in here. I learn some history every time I read. Sounds like the author is struggling to get submissions unfortunately. I'd hate to see this one disappear.

• What to learn - On skilling up on a couple of things rather than spreading yourself thin. Dan writes well, has has a whole archive of similar gems.

• Silverton, an Oregon Town in the Cascades Foothills That’s Absolutely Worth the Extra Mile - Just a nice write-up of someone observing and enjoying walking around Silverton.