I just spent (checks watch) an hour trying to setup a Windows review laptop.

One hour. Just to get to log in and use the device.

Maybe I should start charging an hourly rate to review Windows laptops. Such a ridiculous waste of time.

I need to get car insurance quotes. I spend 5 minutes filling in a form of details, only to be told that they will call me to discuss.

The phone starts ringing seconds later.

To hell with that.

Your number is now blocked and I will never use your services. I’d probably walk into the ocean before I picked up the phone to talk to an insurance salesperson. Pretty sure avoiding these people is why the internet was invented.

Saturday afternoon family time

Wow, Samsung. Only my closest friends call me “7613683d989a57d6abaa293bc039dbae”.

I just received a message on LinkedIn: “I wanted to introduce [redacted], an exclusive members club for entrepreneurs with $1M+ in revenue, and our Early Stage Business Community for those with $200K–$1M. I’d love to schedule a quick call to learn more about your business and see if either … read more

I will probably end up writing it up for BTTR more comprehensively, but the past few days I decided to try and use Gemini to add features and update my portfolio site: nick.broughall.com.au. I built that site earlier this year for a job application. I liked the idea of creating something I … read more

At some point today I have to climb up into my ceiling to look at the leak in my roof. Our old antenna – which hasn’t been used in almost 15 years – has cracked, giving the rain a way into the roof. I’ll have to decide if I should just pull it out or get it fixed in case we ever move.

Things that are driving me crazy this week: People opining Apple is failing with its AI initiatives, when everyone else’s AI solutions are terrible for the quality of the Internet, small business and the environment.

Give me a shit Siri over the crap Google plans to unleash every day of the week.

Feeling a bit overwhelmed and depressed by Google’s I/O announcements overnight. It’s so hard to see a way to succeed as an individual publisher in the face of Google’s strategy to vacuum up all the content and repurposing it to keep people on Google.

I made bread today while testing the Ankarsrum mixer. It was incredible.

I’m really enjoying the new Counting Crows album: Butter Miracle, The Complete Sweets!, but it’s so short! Especially because the second half just runs into eachother, making it sound like one long song. It ends before I’m ready for it to stop.

I just received our annual car insurance quote. The car is 5 years old now, so it’s getting on a little bit. But other than the extra year of age, nothing has changed on our end. From the insurer’s side, the amount the car is valued at has dropped $5,500. Sure, I understand depreciation. That’s … read more

Just watching some football and reviewing a big-ass TV on a Friday night.

Multitasking effort for the day: making lunchbox snacks while testing the Ankarsrum mixer. Can confirm they taste pretty good.

First play through of Striga in The Witcher: Path of Destiny, and my first two player game. There was a bit of confusion on Lauren’s part around the secret objectives which meant she wasn’t playing for them properly. But I did, so I won!

Ended up with a higher score than what was on the board’s track, though.

Have enjoyed watching a bit of football this season. The Bulls didn’t make the finals and lost tonight, but at least we managed to get to the match.

Another playthrough of The Witcher: Path of Destiny today. Stuck with The End of the World story as I convinced the boy to play with us this time around, and wanted it to be simple for him to learn.

Things flowed much smoother this time around. In the end, three of us tied on the victory track, which meant absolute victory was based on the initiative track - which is something I don’t love about the game, to be honest.

But we ended up playing through a different storyline and it was a good time. Looking forward to cracking into the Striga story next time around!

🎲

Why does the internet only ever feel slow here when I’m trying to download a 20GB image file for a story?

Ahh. The mad scramble to find all my documents from 12 months ago before I go to the accountant tomorrow to do my tax return. Fun night for me!

At the behest of the boy, today we played Monopoly. We played the Avengers version, which adds some really interesting elements that made it the most interesting game of Monopoly I have played in a while. I lost, completely, but had some fun doing it. There were still tears (but not mine).