Daughter had her piano performance today and she smashed it. So very proud of her. And not just because she’s looking over my shoulder as I write this. 🤣🤣

My son’s tech assessment on Friday is cooking up a burger, so he had a practice run through cooking for the family tonight. It was really good!

Love having to explain what a vasectomy is to the kids after watching an episode of Malcolm in the Middle together…

How is it that teenagers know exactly what buttons to push? What should have been a fun night of Star Wars has descended into everyone being upset. Ugh.

Unbelievably, my baby girl is having her high school taster day today.

Where did the last decade go?

Now that the kids are back at school, I’ve been more focused on trying to work.

And now that I’m more focused on trying to work, I’m less focused on writing stuff here.

I need to consciously remember to write here.

What a great family day.

We took the kids bowling. It has been a long time since any of us has been bowling. We were all pretty terrible, but it didn’t matter. We had fun.

We had Yum Cha for lunch and burgers for dinner. We played air hockey and pool and ate Churros for dessert.

It was just a really nice, fun day.

Looking forward to the kids going back to school next week, though.

It’s still school holidays, and today my daughter has pulled out Disney Infinity.

I’ve watched her play through both the Inside Out game and the Star Wars Clone Wars missions.

She is having the time of her life.

I know the toys to life games were such a ridiculous money grab, but I still love the variety of Disney Infinity.

It was such a fantastic implementation of Disney’s many, many IPs. Not just from the characters themselves, but also the story-mission games they launched. Plus there were consolidated games, like the racer and the Marvel brawler game!

I’m still disappointed they cancelled it.

I can’t help but wonder what they could have introduced over the years since it was scrapped.

Combining all the Marvel characters to take on Thanos and the Infinity stones?

Rescuing Grogu as The Mandalorian?

Branching into all the Fox franchises? Imagine a Simpsons game! Even better, being able to play in the Toy Box with Homer and Luke Skywalker.

I guess I should still be thankful for the games we did get in the series.

But I can’t help but wonder what could have been…

Today my son and I raced up a hill. It was a decent hill; a dirt track with loose rocks, tufts of grass and scattered leaves.

We started together, and he immediately pulled ahead. I watched him accelerate as my body slowed. I pushed harder and made minuscule gains, before he stretched his legs and left me panting in his dust.

Hours later, I’m still feeling it. He hasn’t let me forget he beat me, either.

Challenged the kids to some handball today, and despite my increasing age, it’s good to know I can still show them their place — which is down in the Dunce square, looking up at their King.

I don’t know if it’s just the relief of getting through the school year and mentally switching off, but both the kids have been terrors today. Absolutely exhausting. I’m completely shattered from dealing with them.

This morning, on my first day of not being employed, I took my son to school and watched him receive a couple of awards.

Normally I would have left after he had received his award so I could get back to work. But because I was in no rush today, I decided to sit through the whole experience.

It was great. It was taking a long, calming, deep breath of air after holding my breath for a long time.

I heard talented student musicians play and watched a year 11 student perform a monologue for 10 minutes in front of the entire school and parents.

I got a little bored listening to every student who won an award get called out, go on stage and shake hands. But it was a good boredom. It was a relaxing boredom.

It was a boredom without pressure and that’s exactly what I needed.

One of the hardest things about being an adult is having to work out what to cook for dinner every night. Especially with 1 child with dietary requirements, another who is a bit fussy, and a wife who says she needs to eat more fish and vegetarian meals, which neither kid likes.

Yesterday I was feeling inspired and bought a nice roast lamb for tonight’s dinner. Today though, I have very little motivation to actually cook it up. 

But I have kids to feed, so off to the kitchen I go.

How is it my brain can retain the lyrics to pretty much every Bon Jovi song from the 1990s, but I need to ask my kids 10 times what they want on their burritos because I keep forgetting?

Just got home from a great day out with the family. Saw Wakanda Forever, enjoyed a great dinner and then saw David Gray play his White Ladder tour. Still buzzing.

I’ve been having some pretty deep conversations with my kids recently. Now they are both in double digits, it’s increasingly challenging to adjust their outlook on the world, to acknowledge the good with the bad and the bad with the good.

Absolutely devastated for my little girl, who is going to have to miss her first camp tomorrow (technically it’s a day camp) after 2.5 years of lock down and general crappiness because she’s too sick.

So far the entirety of the 2020s has been one great big disappointment.

Last week a colleague told me she was pregnant.

While congratulating her, I had an insight: Now that my own kids are a bit older and more self-sufficient, I feel like I need them more than they need me.

I wish I could have given them more of my time when they really needed it.

Parenting a teenager: A poem

At least we can feed the beast
Flour, water, sugar, and yeast
And he will think it a feast

Teenagers are so exhausting. It’s like having a toddler again, except he talks back every time.

Managed to go out to dinner with the wife (and without the kids) for the first time since March last year. It was wonderful. I’ve missed those quiet meals.