neighbours – dangermouse.net

Neighbourly coincidences

Today I wrote my new critical/ethical thinking class, this week on the topic of Light and Darkness. This is a sort of mish-mash of different concepts only linked by their relationship to light and darkness. I touch on fear of the dark, artificial lighting and the fact humans do stuff at all hours of the night, light pollution, creative uses of light and darkness, health and environmental effects, and some speculative what-if questions like, “What if the world had no night time?” and the opposite, “What if there was no daytime?” (assuming enough warmth that we wouldn’t just freeze).

I had the first class tonight and it went pretty well, despite having just one student this time. So at least I have enough questions!

I cooked pizza for diner, and used the warm oven to bake some chocolate chip cookies afterwards. I’ve made cookies many times, but they always spread out very flat and semi-merge into one another. I found recently that the secret to avoiding this is to chill the dough before baking, so it doesn’t have as much time to flow in between being put into the oven and setting firm. I’ve wanted to make cookies for a while to use up some carob powder and leftover choc chips, and had some time around lunch to make the dough and then set it in the fridge to chill for several hours before baking.

The cookies came out nicely! I decided to take a few on a paper plate over to our new neighbours as a mini housewarming gift, to welcome them to the building. While I was chatting with the woman at their threshold, I noticed that on the bookcase behind her were several board games: Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, and Azul among them. I mentioned my wife and I were into board games too, and said we’d have to invite them over for a games night some time. They both sounded keen.

I can ease them in with games like Kingdomino and Camel Up, before seeing how game they are for something complex like Root. And then of course I have to test the waters to see how they feel about roleplaying games… Maybe we’ve found a couple of new Dungeons & Dragons players!

Catching up with old neighbours

Friday I did my usual routine: pick up groceries, teach a bunch of ethics classes, then in the evening it was board games night. This week was online, but only three of us could make it. We played a game of Parks, which is a longish game, so that took up some time. I came a close second, though I thought I was in with a good chance of winning before the bonus pints were calculated. We cut the night short after that as one player wanted an early night and the two of us who remained decided not to continue with just two people.

Both Friday and today were cold and rainy as we continue to be hit by this southerly weather. I was woken in the middle of the night by several long rolls of thunder, and there has been intermittent dry spells and thundery showers today.

Today I cleaned up the house and I also went to the liquor store to stock up on wines because tonight we had guests over. Our old neighbours who had to move out of the apartment next door when the owner sold it (they were renting). This is what’s resulted in us getting the new neighbours recently (the new owners). We were friendly with the old neighbours, and they’d minded Scully a few times for us. So we invited them over for some pre-dinner drinks and snacks to catch up. They were keen to hear about our trip to Europe and they had various news about their doings as well.

I didn’t go for a run, though I kind of wanted to. But the weather is so cold and miserable, I didn’t want to end up in a rain shower and freeze. I don’t mind running in the rain if it’s warmer, and I don’t mind going out in coldish weather if it’s dry, but the combination is nasty. And it’s been very cold. Thursday was the coldest July day recorded in Sydney for three years, and some suburbs recorded their coldest July day in 35 years. Around 12°C maximum, which really is about as cold as it ever gets here. (It may not sound so bad for people used to colder climates, but for subtropical people like me this is unbearable.)

Neighbours moving in

Friday I did the usual: Pick up groceries in the morning, teaching a bunch of critical thinking/ethics classes online, then Friday evening board games night. It was a fairly small grocery shop this week, after last week’s big one. I ordered online, except for fresh fruit and vegetables, as I normally do, and selected those myself before picking up the order. For some reason the supermarket included a dozen eggs in my order, even though I didn’t order any. Well, given the scarcity and price of eggs these days I’m not going to complain about getting a dozen free. So for dinner I decided to make quiche and use up most of the previous dozen.

Games night was meant to be in person this fortnight, but one guy was away skiing and two others recused themselves due to sniffles and not wanting to spread potential cold or flu viruses. With very small numbers for in-person, we converted it to online, and ended up with five participants, including the guy who was down at the snow, so that worked out pretty well.

We played Marrakech to start, then a long game of Castles of Burgundy. I didn’t win either. Then we moved to Just One, which is really optimal at 5 players. We got off to a bad start, missing the first two words, but recovered to score a mediocre 11 from 15.

Today I slept in a bit, still catching up on sleep after getting over the jetlag. I think I’m good now though. Scully had her annual checkup and vaccinations today, and my wife took her in to the vet for those. I went for a 5k run. The weather was cooler today and I ran my best time since getting back from Europe. I’m also getting back into the groove there after three weeks break.

And our new neighbours moved in today. We didn’t see much of them, but heard the movers bringing in furniture. Presumably we’ll bump into them in the next few days and have a proper introduction.

This afternoon I did a task I needed to get done for Standards Australia. We decided to revise our document outlining the case for international participation in the standardisation of photography technology, and I get to go over and update the text. I rewrote parts to reflect various changes in applications of photographic technology over the past 5 years or so since we last did this. I had to look up Government policy on things like self-driving cars to update statements about them and the role of cameras in safety monitoring. At the last update, the text said that officially released policy was that self-driving cars would be on Australian roads by 2026, but the latest update now says between 2026 and 2031. So it seems they’re pushing the date out as they realise the technology isn’t mature enough yet.

Tonight for dinner we took a long walk to the pizza place at Naremburn. We tried to get a table at our favourite pizza place, but they had a large booking in the outdoor section, so we couldn’t get in. So we decided to go further to this other one. It’s a bit more old school – they only have the traditional sort of pizza toppings that places had 30 or 40 years ago, and none of the new “gourmet” variations that many pizza places have now with ingredients like satay chicken or figs and gorgonzola.

One step back

My recovery from jetlag took a slight backwards step after the previous night’s good sleep. I did sleep more than I have been for the past week, but woke up a few times and tossed and turned a bit, but did eventually drift back off. But I felt much better during the day today; I didn’t get a strong tired spell mid-afternoon. So hopefully things are rejigging into place.

I worked on my new week’s ethics lesson plan. This week we’re going to discuss predictions, ranging from fortune tellers, to weather forecasts, to eclipses. Thinking about how reliable different sorts of predictions are and why, and how you can tell the difference. And the importance of predictions in everyday life, for example: Will that car hit me if I cross the road now? Where is the ball going and where should I run to kick it? How long is my homework going to take to finish? What is my chess opponent going to do? Should I take an umbrella today?

In other teaching news, I got contacted by CSIRO about hooking up with a new partner school for their STEM Professionals in Schools programme. The teacher at the school I visited a few times last year lost contact and apparently left the programme, so I was waiting for them to find me another nearby school to go to. They’ve partnered me up with Wenona, a girls’ high school not far from home, a little closer than Loreto actually. I’ve reached out to the contact teacher there by email, and hopefully will get a response soon and set up a meeting.

Scully and I went on a couple of walks. Returning from the second one, we bumped int our new neighbours in the hallway. They’ve had workers in today installing new timber flooring. They asked me about the locations of the gas meters, since they have a natural gas company rep coming tomorrow to read the meters prior to initiating a new account for them. And they said the renovation work should be completed by Friday, and they are moving in on Saturday. It’s a youngish couple, maybe late 20s or early 30s. They also said hi to Scully, though they weren’t super enthusiastic dog-lover racing over to skritch her. Though it might have been the fact they were both holding large boxes of renovation material.

For dinner I made cauliflower steaks, which are all the rage in vegetarian circles at the moment. Simple sliced a cauliflower into thick slabs, roasted it in olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper until it was going crispy, and served it with a tahini and lemon sauce and a side salad. Very delicious.

Apartment for sale next door

Okay, I made an error two days ago when I said that new neighbours had moved in to the apartment next door. Yesterday I saw a woman in business dress come in with a man carrying a tripod and a big bag of gear. I wondered if it was actually a real estate agent photographing the place to produce a sale listing, and the furniture being moved in the day before was only temporary decoration for photography and to display the place to prospective buyers.

Today in our letter box was a flyer advertising exactly that. They had photos of the interior with the furniture I saw being moved in on Tuesday, and it was announcing that the apartment is now up for sale. There will be an open house inspection for prospective buyers this Saturday, and the place will go up for auction on 8 March. (I don’t know about other countries or cities, but here in Sydney almost all homes are sold by auction these days rather than a fixed price sale.)

When I last talked to the neighbours who just moved out, I was in their place as they were removing the last of their furniture. I mentioned that each time people moved out we were tempted to knock down the adjoining wall from our place and claim the second bedroom, and brick up the bedroom’s doorway into that apartment. And ta-da! We’d have another bedroom! And my neighbour was very encouraging and said we should totally do it. 😁

In other events today, I had my usual bunch of ethics classes. In the afternoon I drove wth Scully up to the liquor store to stock up on wine (since we have virtually none left) and also get some beer for Dungeons & Dragons tomorrow night. And around 5pm I took her for a walk up to the local shops, where I bought some eggs, since we were low, and the supermarket is perpetually empty of eggs these days so I can’t get them in the usual weekly grocery shop. Bird flu is affecting poultry farms here in Australia too, and we’ve had egg shortages in the supermarkets for months, although small independent grocers still have supplies from smaller farms that the supermarkets don’t use as suppliers.

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New old furniture and peanut butter bars

I forgot to mention yesterday that our new neighbours from South Africa finally got their furniture delivered. They moved in in mid-January and shipped their furniture over from South Africa, but it was held up in customs and strikes and so on, and only released last week. So all day yesterday there were movers bringing things in, and causing Scully to growl at the noises in the hallway.

I kind of wondered why they’d go to all the expense of shipping furniture internationally, rather than just sell it and buy new furniture here. From what I saw, I think a lot of it must be antique, so I guess they were attached to it.

Today I wrote my next ethics class; this week it will on the topic of Artificial Intelligence. I had too much to talk about – there are more questions than I can possibly ask in most of the class groups. But that’s better than not having enough material!

I did some comics stuff. And I took Scully for a walk at lunch and got myself a Ridiculously Delicious™ cherry and coconut peanut butter chocolate bar at the grocery store.

I tried this brand some time ago and found they were indeed ridiculously delicious as claimed on the wrapping. They come in three flavours: orignal crunch, salted caramel, and cherry coconut. I think last time I had the original crunch one, which was fantastic, and today’s cherry one was too. They’re not too sweet, and have a very adult blend of flavours, which is better than the overly sweet taste of most chocolate bars.

Oh, and I had a weird dream last night. I was playing some sort of 500-like card game with people. I got dealt a hand and it was like 40 cards or something – so many I couldn’t sensibly hold them and see them all of them in my hand at once. I had a lot of hearts, so I started confidently bidding hearts, and I guess my partner thought I had high hearts so joined in, and we ended up in some huge hearts bid.

Then when we started playing, a few tricks went by, and then suddenly an opponent played something like a 14 of hearts. I was surprised, not expecting to see anything different to a normal deck, since all my hearts were in the range 2-10. And then they explained it was like a 6-handed deck with numbers that go up to 13, except this deck went all the way from 2 up to 25 before the face cards and ace.

I told this dream to my friends on our Discord and two of them immediately said that it couldn’t have been a hand of 40 cards – it must have been 28. Nerds. 🙄

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Meeting the new neighbours in a strange way

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I’d briefly met our new neighbours across the hall from our apartment. And that they had a dog and cat in quarantine after emigrating from South Africa.

Early this evening as I was bringing Scully in from a toilet break outside, I heard the sound of a dark barking from their apartment. I figured they must have their pets out of quarantine. Scully reacted to the barking by barking back, and my wife and I discussed and thought it would be a good idea to get the two dogs to meet each other and become familiar, so they won’t be barking through the door at each other all the time. We thought now was as good a time as any, and knocked on their door.

They answered, the woman coming out holding their dog – a west highland terrier which we learnt was named Sophie. Scully and Sophie had a bit of a sniff and started to get used to one another. The woman’s husband stepped out to say hello to us as well… and accidentally let the door slip closed behind him. He asked his wife if she had the key, but she didn’t. They’d locked themselves out of their apartment!

I asked if they had anyone with a spare key, and they said no, since they’d just moved to Australia recently. They didn’t have phones on them, so I got mine and found a 24-hour locksmith nearby and called to have them come over. They said they’d be about half an hour.

Rather than let them wait in the corridor, we invited them into our place. They turned out to be very nice people and we chatted about our dogs, their move from South Africa, and various other things while we waited. It turns out all their furniture is still sitting in a shipping container at Port Botany, after several weeks of delays in arriving, and then a port workers’ strike, and now customs inspection of everything they’ve brought over. The man said how nice it was to sit on our sofa – at the moment they only have some folding chairs in their place to sit on! We also learnt that their dog Sophie had only arrived at 4:30pm today, after having been flown from the quarantine facility in Melbourne, so they’d only had about an hour with her before we knocked and they got locked out!

Eventually the locksmith arrived and let them in. We felt terrible for having started this chain of events and apologised repeatedly and offered to pay for the locksmith, but they were very gracious about it and insisted on paying themselves. A bit of a misfortune, but at least we had the chance to sit and have a bit of an introductory chat. They said they’d invite us over for a drink when they get their furniture.

In other news today I received a mail order of some more board game expansions for Root. I decided to take the plunge and order some of them now in case they go out of print at some point. There are a few small ones already out of print and hard to find, but fortunately I managed to get those in the special Kickstarter edition of one of the other expansions I bought from the game store.

I had four classes to finish off the “Why?” topic for the week. And I put together a presentation to give at the next ISO Photography Standards meeting next week, on details for the meeting I’ll be hosting in Sydney in October. It was finally approved by Standards Australia, and now we can start giving delegates information on things like visa requirements, hotels, and so on. So it’s been a busy day.

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New neighbours and old ankles

Friday was board games night at a friend’s place, so no post yesterday. I arrived just in time to join a game of The Guild of Merchant Explorers, which was new to me. It was a fun game of exploring across a personal hex map (each player had an identical map), establishing towns and trying to connect trade routes to earn coins. I liked it, but I ended up significantly behind everyone else, finishing with about 130 coins while all the other three players were within a few coins of each other around 150.

After this we played a game of Mysterium, at the medium difficulty level. I was going really well, guessing my character and location quickly, but I got stuck on the weapon, guessing wrong 3 times and ultimately being the only player not to correctly get all of my information! Being a cooperative game, that meant we all lost, alas.

Then we finished off with a game of Just One, which I’ve played a lot online, but never with the actual boxed game equipment. That went pretty well and we scored a lot of matches.

Another thing that happened is I met one of our new neighbours, who moved in this week. It’s an older couple, retiree age, and they’re from South Africa. I met the woman and she met Scully, and was delighted to meet her. She said that they had a Maltese terrier and a cat, but they are in quarantine after arriving from South Africa and wouldn’t be moving in until February. When they arrive we’ll have to make sure Scully meets the dog and becomes friendly.

Today I slept in a bit and then went for a 5k run in the relative cool of the morning. Unfortunately at one point I had to step off the footpath to go around a clump of pedestrians and I twisted my ankle on the grass. It wasn’t bad at the time and I finished the run, in better time than my last couple of runs. But through the day it’s gotten more sore and swelled up a little bit. I’ve started putting ice on it to reduce the swelling and inflammation. But I doubt I’ll be doing a run tomorrow. I can walk okay, and in fact we did a couple of long walks today with Scully, but I don’t want to risk running on it.

We went over to Naremburn after lunch for a sweet treat from the bakery – I got a cinnamon roll. And then we went out again for dinner, to a seafood restaurant that we really like. I had mahi-mahi, which was really nice.

I spent a few hours today refining an adventure for next Saturday’s Scum & Villainy game that I’ll be running at the local science shop. I’ve found a one-shot adventure outline for Blades in the Dark, and I’m reskinning it from fantasy to science fiction in the Star Wars setting. It’s coming along nicely, and hopefully should be a lot of fun.

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