Category: General (Page 1 of 2)

The Cruelest Blow

July 21, 2026 / Steve / 0 Comments

July has been an awful month. I lost my uncle, my good friend had an adverse medical diagnosis, and our beautiful granddaughter Penny passed away on 6th July.

She was only 3, all set to be 4 in September. Without any warning, poor Penny had some seizures, likely caused by a lack of oxygen to the brain caused by the eventual diagnosis of dilated cardiomyopathy, or “saggy heart”. She had successful surgery the Saturday before she died, and signs were promising, but subsequent seizures on 6th July meant her brain and body could no longer cope, and she quietly slipped away.

It’s devastated the whole family, and beyond. Such a bubbly, bright, beautiful little girl stricken off, no reason. The cruelest blow to my amazing son and his beautiful partner.

I’m taking some time out from work to try and come to terms with this, and to help my son and partner where I can. We will all love her and miss her terribly. She was unforgettable.

There is very little consolation other than my son and partner have a beautiful 4-month-old lad, and I’ve seen just how strong they are together in dealing with this.

The funeral in Gloucester was beautiful; emotional, poignant, and appropriate for a little girl who brought joy and fun to all those around her.

Donations can be made at:
The Grand Appeal – Bristol Children’s Hospital Charity

To YouTube or not to YouTube?

April 19, 2026 / Steve

Shall I or shan’t I?

Well, think I shall.

My biggest problem is procrastination, and I’ve thought about this whole YouTube malarkey a LOT. The biggest struggle point for me has been, frankly, what to YouTube about. I love personal productivity stuff, books, guitar and generally yacking about rock/prog music, gar-dunning, and a few tech/coding things.

There are loads of YouTube videos out there saying that you must have a niche and a single topic to focus on. I see the logic in that if you aim to focus solely on views or monetisation.

I’m also not under any illusions. I’m not trying to out-beast MrBeast or chuck in my job before I retire. It’s about a bit of fun, learning, experimentation, and on the subject of retirement. it could be something to keep me busy in my dotage.

I’m almost certain the main focus will be on gardening.🌻

Slight problem. I’m no gardener. I’m also pretty lousy at DIY. I have a record of killing more plants than growing them. BUT…. this will be a learning project, it’s something I can grow into (every pun intended) and hopefully may encourage participation and knowledge-sharing with other gar-dunn-friendly folk out there.

So gardening (or gar-dunn-ing) is where my YouTube focus will be. However, I reserve the right to clack about other things also! Whether it’s waxing lyrical about the latest Deep Purple or Also Eden album…. a review of a Stephen King book…. a verdict on West Ham’s season (SPOILER: it’s been lousy) …. a chat about the latest GitHub/Azure tidbits I’ve found, or about orange gentlemen starting new world wars.

Let’s see how it goes. It’ll no doubt be ropey… but hey, we all gotta start somewhere…. Watch this space! Oh, and this one.

What I’m reading/learning in April!

April 19, 2026 / Steve

Well, I finished The Hobbit finally!

Verdict…enjoyable 🙂 but (so sorry, Tolkien officiandos) I actually preferred the films – there seemed to be much more going on than in the book itself.

Anyhoo. Back to April. I’m now reading Consider Phlebas by Iain M Banks on Kindle. Haven’t read proper spacey science fiction for a long time. The last time was probably about 20 years ago (2001, 2010, and 2061 from the late great Arthur C. Clarke). As a kid, I loved reading Asimov (Foundation series in particular), and the original Star Wars books (when Star Wars was only just out at the cinema nearly 50 years ago!).

Otherwise for April, it’s Under The Dome (Stephen King) on Audible, and I’m dabbling with my latest gar-dunning book – The Cottage Garden Month-by-Month (Jackie Bennett – this is an older book, cost me all of £5 on Amazon).

I’m laying off the productivity books this month – mainly because I’m busy studying for a GitHub exam, and doing Horticulture assignments through my distance learning course (was delighted with the 85% result for my first assignment last month).

I’m a Grandad again!

March 2, 2026 / Steve

Welcome into the world, Bobby Arthur Dunn! Our 3rd grandchild and 1st grandson. Born this morning 06:01, 8lbs 13 ozs. Can’t wait to see you in a few weeks, son!

What I’m reading in March

March 1, 2026 / Steve

The Hobbit – I love my new Kindle, just not using it so much. I’m about 3/4 of the way through the book!
I’ll use the Kindle more in the evening now before getting some shut-eye (if I can pry my eyes off the iPad and those daft YouTube shorts).

I’ve just finished Duma Key by Stephen King, now it’s time for Under The Dome.

I’ve decided to revisit “Make Time” by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky. I’ve been a GTD fan-boy for years, but I need something that’s simple, less heavy maintenance-wise… and fun. I’ll probably put a review up about the book when I’m done.

Hello March!

March 1, 2026 / Steve

2 months down already? Wow.

Things are good, it’s been super busy at work, and me & Liz can’t wait to welcome our 3rd grandchild (and 1st grandson) Bobby into the world. Any day now…..!

This month will see the clocks rolling forward – very much looking forward to longer evenings. Loads of gar-Dunning to do.

This month will seal up the first quarter of the year. Loads to do this year!

I’ve already submitted the first of my (many) horticulture assignments – really hoping to make progress on another assignment this month – all about “how plants work”!

I’ve started GH900 and AZ204 studies, although work being so busy has meant not as much as I would have liked to do.

I’m still undecided about whether to set up a complementary YouTube channel. It might be fun -but it might all be more work than I have time to devote to. I’ll continue to drop in blog posts for the moment while I organise my thoughts about YouTube.

Hello February!

February 1, 2026 / Steve

January was a tricky month!

After an amazing Christmas break, January seemed to run so sloooooow.

Getting back to work has been a little tough due to health issues, and 2026 is shaping up to be a super-busy year. Loads of organisational structural change. Not a bad thing, but getting better organised has been my job for January.

And I’ve mostly done that. I’ve worked out what I want to study this year, work we’re doing in the house and the garden and sorting out my “life pockets” – those categories that everything fits into.

Managed to sort out my planner requirements for the remainder of the year with what I think could well be my ultimate analogue planning tools.

Made the usual million lists (or boards, in Todoist – more of this sometime soon) of things I’d like to achieve every quarter and every month for both work and home. I’m feeling in a good place to do them, for once!

Home-wise, there’s loads to do. I bought a new propagator recently, so I’m immediately sorting my plant seeds for this year. Our shed outside has some wood damage, so I’ll need to get that sorted and repaired. I’ve already ripped the interior apart to reorganise all my tools and stuff. Other Gar-dunn-ing jobs this month include moving a few trees around, clearing pots… and probably having a mega tip run at the end of Feb.

The lawn looks like The Somme thanks to our nutty English Springer Spaniel Marley, and the terrible wet weather. I’ll probably have to wait until May before I can start doing repairs on it. Drainage is really rough, and Marley’s carved his own little runway out.

Joined the gym (again), so looking to get some upper body stuff going, as well as shedding the odd stone or 8.

My dad’s grandfather clock, which he built back in the 90s, will be repaired and serviced at last. It stopped working about 5 years ago and Mum never bothered to get it repaired. It’ll be great to have it working again. Not cheap… but it’s a lovely bit of furniture – and having it working again will bring back some fond memories of him.

And last, but absolutely not least, my grandson Bobby will come into the world. The Dunn line will go on!!

Right. let’s get this Feb Party started. 🎈

What I’m reading – Feb ’26

February 1, 2026 / Steve

February sees me reading:

The Hobbit (J.R.R Tolkien) -Dang it. I’m still 60% of the way through this book, didn’t read any of it in January. Time to finish it!

Blaze (Stephen King)

Once I’ve completed Blaze I’ll be listening to the full-cast editions of the Harry Potter books from Audible. Not exactly stimulating the grey matter, but definitely fun.

Other books are far too nerdy and boring but necessary for my learning things in 2026 – GitHub, Azure and Horticultural things!

Learning Activities for 2026!

January 25, 2026 / Steve

I decided to take Naomi’s (from Todoist) excellent post, suggesting we use the whole of January to decide on the best learning activities to take.

I think it’s really helped me pause for breath and play around with a few learning topics.

And here’s my selections for ’26.

Horticulture Studies – this is a course I picked up around August last year, but I have not found the time to work on (lots of building projects going on last year!). I’m working through the first few modules now, and am hoping to get my first assignment in shortly. Learning and working on horticulture projects is a great way for me to learn about the gardening things I love to do – and hope to do for many years to come.
AZ-204 Developing Solutions for Microsoft Azure – Microsoft certification. This will become increasingly important as my workplace is now shifting significantly to the cloud. I’m looking forward to getting stuck in to it. Time to blow the dust of my Azure subscription.
GH-900 GitHub Foundations Certification – useful for personal projects I’m working on, but even more so as it’s clear that Microsoft are ploughing dollars into GitHub. I’m betting that Azure DevOps will get morphed into GitHub Enterprise in the next few years. This looks like a fun little qualification, and will almost certainly help me bring a few Git skills up to date.

What I’m reading – Jan 26

January 4, 2026 / Steve

January sees me reading:

The Hobbit (J.R.R Tolkien) – I took a break from this book in December to read all of A Christmas Carol, and all of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall Trilogy!

Lizey’s Story (Stephen King)

Slow Productivity (Cal Newport)