I spent over an hour lifting up a corner of my grass tonight so I could replace a sprinkler head. Youtube made it look very easy, but I think my garden shovel was the wrong tool compared to the pointer spades I saw online.

I eventually did uncover enough to unscrew the top and put a new head on. Luckily when I mowed over it last week I just clipped it, and the barrel was intact. I probably wouldn’t have mowed over it if I had a better lawn mower, but I don’t. What am I supposed to do? Buy a garden spade and a new lawnmower and a new shaver head every few months?

On Monday we had a blackout for a few hours. When the power came back on, the alarm system control by the back door was flashing. I have enough LEDs in my life so I pressed some buttons to try and stop the flashing. This armed the alarm system. I did not receive the code to the alarm system from the original owners. A few seconds later the alarm went off.

The house alarm was very loud. Luckily I knew where the box was - in the roof cavity. I also had experience from the old house which also had an alarm system. At that house I unplugged the alarm system, but later it went off and I learned that there was a battery connected for backup. So, I went into the roof cavity and there I learned that the alarm was hardwired in this house AND the battery connection was corroded on. Fortunately, I was in there with a Philips head screwdriver that I’d needed to get into the alarm box in the first place. And I realised that I could use this to unscrew and pull all the wires from their connections. This took a few minutes, and it was quite satisfying hearing each siren and alarm go silent as I pulled out wire after wire. It was like defusing a bomb in a movie.

I am not sure I have done anything to actually improve the house recently, despite many attempts. I can’t just blame my tools. I think I am the tool. I did buy an inflatable basketball hoop slash ring toss for the pool. Let’s count that as a win.

Did I see the aurora tonight? No. But my camera did!

It's 2026 and I have officially spent $8.60 on a single coffee. It was jumbo sized at least. And served by the seaside.

Shortly afterwards I was donating some blood and I suppose some caffeine at the blood donation place. As can be expected, everyone at the blood donation clinic is very interested to take your blood. "Would you like to make a future appointment?", "You have such good veins."

I got a keyring and a cookie although I handed back the cookie. The keyring will help me remember my blood type.

The blood people also recommended something salty to help recovery. Probably because they want to take more blood. So for dinner we got take away fish and chips with lots of salt and then we walked in the shallows along the beach which is also salty.

I have owned my baseball cap for six seven different years now, so it felt like it was time to wear it somewhere appropriate like an actual baseball game.

Adelaide won a very long game against the Sydney Blue Sox thanks to a 5 run seventh innings. It allowed plenty of time to catch up with friends.

I also experienced the most connection to Australia that I have felt for quite some time, standing to listen to an instrumental of the national anthem with a thousand other people, not one of us singing.

If tonight’s baseball game was a metaphor for 2026, it will start slowly, pick up quite drastically in Spring, and then drag out to a successful but slow conclusion. The last part of the year might get skipped.

I don’t think 2026 will be a microcosm of a baseball game. At least I hope it won't.

It's the days between Christmas and New Year's. There could be no better time to reflect on the year that has passed. And also to study for a tech certification to add to my portfolio / meet my KPI during customer downtime.

If we felt like it, we could unify data across multiple, disparate Brad source systems and harmonise them into a common data model. Surely this would be a way to discover insights.
Could that data be normalised? Of course. Would it be normal?

Let's say we used some of the many connectors available out of the box - or from packages - to ingest this data. Perhaps for certain sources we'd need to vibe-code our own integration and push data via the ingestion API.

What Data Lake Objects would those streams provide?

Norway bookings for rooms by lakes.
Health data recording steps walked around lakes.
Purchase history and ATV at the supermarkets at West Lakes.

We could pull Spotify plays, Hevy workout logs, physio case notes, backup physio case notes, Cursor tab completions, licorice deposits, investment profits and losses, X-ray reports, Scandinavian geolocations, dog hairs swallowed, JaVale McGee dunks witnessed. Quiz night questions answered—and botched. Calf raises. Kombucha consumed (free and paid). Solar kilowatts generated. pH and chlorine measurements. Journal entries posted. Board games played (against others, between Brads).

With enough data, we would be getting a comprehensive view of our customers. Music Brad, Gym Brad, Family Brad, Work Brad, House Brad. And then we could unify them. Match them all by fuzzy name and email address, plus a custom rule on an identifier or two. We could get 100% consolidation, but I suspect that would be an overgrouping.

From there, we could create a segment with a filter, limiting our audience to engagements where YEAR(date) = 2025. We could include some calculated insights, though we'd probably need our data-aware specialist for that, and I'd need to check Profile Explorer tomorrow to work out *which* Brad he got consolidated into.

With our segment complete, we can activate it and send it to an activation target. I suppose that target should be "2026".

What 2026 is going to do with all those Brads is hard to say.

And that's why it's important to invest time in the design phase and understand your use cases before you start clicking and ingesting. It takes less time to avoid problems than it does to fix them. In theory.

That was a very long spring. Perhaps it’s because this week’s weather - cool, wet and windy, a lot of showers about, bouts of pleasant sunshine - mapped closely to the first week of September’s weather. And in fact nearly every week of the past three months has been cool, wet and windy with lots of showers, and bouts of pleasant sunshine. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a spring with quite so much consistency. I put my jacket away and then got it back out again multiple times. Yet there is no doubt that the sun sets after 8pm now and there was even a test match - briefly- last weekend, so spring did happen.

But what did happen in spring? A lot and not much. Personally that is. Globally and domestically there was a lot going on, but for me the last few months have been one of pleasant routine, general health (ignoring the cold from the end of October that I nearly had to write a memoir about surviving) and mundanity.

I had the same customer all season, the same personal project for the evenings, the same gym routines, a lot of chicken breast salads. A lot of berries, cereal and yogurt. A lot of walking around the same lake, canal and seaside. Some good audio books. Pub Quiz. Walks with Vanessa and Nash - often to the bakery. Lots of good music.

I did go to Sydney. And for some hikes in the hills. And I saw friends and family. One night I saw the southern lights. It was very chill. I could probably have lived in that spring forever.

I clearly had a lot of time for reflection in spring 25 because my spring playlist reached 101 minutes and 26 songs. That’s two new songs a week on average that I considered worth engraving on my psyche to remember this time of my life by.

Songs that remind me of walking while wearing a jacket. Lunchtime exercise. Walking by the lake. Cooking BBQs. Driving around the suburbs. Writing XML by hand. Walking by the lake (again). Going off to get motor oil for my chainsaw. Walking by the lake (a third time). Walking by the lake (wow).